Harry Potter and the Useless Rock
by Lucillia
Summary: Having been raised by his Uncle Genesis in a world where Philosopher's Stones are something between rather common and an annoyance that can seriously back up the plumbing, Harry can't understand why someone would want to guard one, much less steal it.
1. Chapter 1

Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody sat swirling the glass of Firewhiskey in his hand. He knew better than to have more than a drink or two even today. While today was for celebrating the downfall of the latest wanker to call himself a Dark Lord, the real work would begin tomorrow. Tomorrow was when they went out to round up every Death Eater that could be found. Now, he sat swirling his glass remembering the fallen, especially one extremely adorable chubby cheeked toddler turned grown woman named Lily.

Lily. He'd known Lily since before she was even Lily. It had been in the days that he was just getting used to a curse that St. Mungos both didn't understand and couldn't reverse. His maxim of "CONSTANT VIGILANCE" came from the curse that had knocked him out while it rewired a very small part of his brain and its results. Back before he'd learned that little things would do and that he didn't need to grab every last thing his hands itched to take, he'd lived in a tent constantly moving in fear that someone would discover what he'd been doing and would apprehend him. He'd found Lily on his couch when he'd returned home from a long day of pretending everything was normal while he waited for his coworkers to arrest him. At that time, the little two year-old had been calling herself "Ban-Ban".

It had been his fear of discovery that had caused him to place Lily in the muggle orphanage the instant he confirmed that none of the nearby muggle campers or any of the wizarding families in the UK were looking for a child that matched her description. He'd wanted to keep her - she was very adorable and rather well behaved, and he already knew that he would have to adopt if he wanted children thanks to a childhood illness - but if he was discovered with a child that wasn't his along with the items that he'd taken from the Malfoy, Black, Potter, and Longbottom residences before an adoption could go through, people would come to the wrong conclusion and kidnapping was punished far more severely than thievery. The wizarding world wouldn't care that he hadn't taken the child or that he planned to return all of the stolen items anonymously as soon as the itchy feeling he got every time he tried to do so went away. All the wizarding world would have cared about was the crime committed or at the very least the illusion of a crime having been committed.

He'd kept track of her though. He'd watched her when he could. He'd been there the day the small red haired green eyed child was carried out of the orphanage in the arms of her new family. He had watched as they brought her home to a suburb on the edges of a neighborhood that had been created to house the employees of a nearby factory and her new father whirled her around on the small front lawn while her new mother watched and her new sister excitedly ran in circles around them. If he went on the Hogwarts Student Protection Detail that had sprung up after Death Eaters had attacked the Express more times than was strictly necessary, that was his business. When she and James had invited the entire Order to their wedding he had happily accepted the invitation, carefully clearing his schedule so he could attend.

Now the bright little Lily that would have been his if he hadn't been hit by a curse that caused something that was very similar to what the muggles called Kleptomania was gone.

It had been when he finally decided to drain the glass that he'd been nursing for the past hour while reminiscing about his fallen comrades and the woman that could have been his daughter that he'd heard the noise. It had been a thump that came from the direction of the cupboard under the stairs that he stored his trunks in. The thump was soon followed by insistent knocking. Setting his glass down, he grabbed his wand and made his way past the pyramid that consisted of canned food he'd taken from the shelves of several muggle stores, the table of knickknacks he'd palmed on the visits he'd made to both Albus Dumbledore's office and private residence, and his nearly complete tower of Leaky Cauldron salt and pepper shakers. After nearly tripping over his tourists' handbags collection, he finally made his way to the door of the cupboard.

The knocking turned out to have come from the third trunk down, his prized twelve compartmented trunk that came complete with miniature dungeon. Instead of coming from the dungeon as he half expected, the source of the knocking came from his hidden secondary compartment where he kept his collection of "spare" wands, the door of which was located behind the Sneakoscopes. When he opened the small sliding door, he found himself looking into a pair of hazel eyes that were more in the blue/green range than the green/brown range.

"Thank the Goddess, I thought I was going to be trapped in here." the owner of the eyes said.

"What the hell are you doing in my trunk?" Moody asked, almost too surprised to wonder how the hell the man could be in a space that was two feet by two feet by six and a half inches without being squished much less how he could move his arm enough to knock as loudly as he had.

"Honestly, I was looking for my little sister's body so she could have a proper burial, either that or so I could be near her when I died. I didn't expect there to be people living here." the man said, peering up at him.

"Why would you be looking for your little sister in my trunk?" Moody asked.

"Your trunk is stuck in some sort of a giant dimensional pocket. From this side it looks like a small sliding door and a bunch of random polished sticks hanging about in midair. As for why I'm here looking for my little sister...About two decades ago, someone decided to experiment with the dimensional pockets we use to hold the things we can't carry on our persons to see if they could be used to safely transport prisoners. The animal experiments had looked promising so the "geniuses" at the lab - namely that asshat Hojo and his team - decided to try using a human test subject. They acquired this subject by going to a family who had allowed their unborn son to be used in a different experiment a few years earlier and purchased her from them. She went in, and there supposedly was some sort of an equipment failure because after she went in, she never returned. I found the equipment they used abandoned in a storage facility and got it working again, so here I am." the hazel eyed man said.

"But why my trunk?" Moody asked growing a bit more suspicious, after all why him out of all the thousands of expanded trunks out there and why this particular trunk out of all of the trunks he owned. His questions about why the man wasn't squished were answered, but he still wanted to know what the man was doing in his trunk. He had thought to stun first and ask questions later, but spells cast on or in expanded spaces had a bad habit of not working properly. The man hadn't made any threatening moves, but that could change quickly. If he could get him out of the trunk...

"First one I came across. If I saw someone else's, it would have been theirs I was knocking at." the man said, moving in a way that suggested that he was shrugging.

"Why don't you come on through son, and I'll see if your sister didn't pop out of someone's trunk when she got lost. It can't be very comfortable standing where you're standing, being in expanded spaces for a long period of time can be disorienting." Moody said, sounding just a little bit nicer and moved his wand so it wasn't pointed directly between the man's eyes. If he became too nice the man could become suspicious and either run back to where he came from despite claiming to be stuck or simply refuse to come out. If the man was as harmless as he seemed, he would apologize later for what he was about to do to him.

"I'm just going to use this to enlarge the door so you can get out." he said, moving the wand until he held it up in a non-threatening manner so the man would know it wasn't just a weapon seeing as he hadn't recognized the wands that were apparently hanging around his head (either that, or he pretended not to). Enlarging the door was really going to be pushing it, but he was rather curious about how the man had managed to connect his trunk to whatever the man was standing in which made it worth it. And if the man turned out to be a Death Eater...the old laws about the acceptability of using lethal force when defending one's home and property hadn't been stricken off the books yet, and likely wouldn't be any time soon.

As soon as the door was expanded after a bit of a struggle, the head of a man in his early to mid twenties with shoulder length ginger hair and a face that looked vaguely familiar popped out followed by shoulders clad in red leather with black shoulder pads and the hilt of a sword that turned out to be almost as long as the man was tall. When the man was fully out, it was revealed that the red leather coat he was wearing over his black clothing was almost long enough to qualify as a robe.

The instant the man was fully out of the trunk, Moody swiftly stunned him, disarmed him - finding that he had a knife tucked in his boot as well as the sword he carried on his back and that he carried no wand and therefore probably hadn't been pretending not to recognize wands when he was surrounded by them and had one pointed at him - and tied him to a chair. After giving him three drops of Veritaserum, he ennervated him.

"What is your name?" he asked.

"Genesis Rhapsodos." the man replied in a toneless voice indicating that the veritaserum was working.

"Are you a Death Eater?" he asked, deciding to get the question out of the way and maybe postpone the rest of the interrogation until he'd had a bit of fun with him if the answer was in the affirmative.

"No." Genesis replied.

"How did you get into my trunk?" he asked. While the man wasn't a Death Eater, that didn't mean he wasn't a threat.

"I activated the equipment used in the Shinra Corporation's dimensional pocket experiments. Using the same machine that was used on my sister, I was able to create a dimensional pocket with a large enough opening to crawl through. Once inside I found that I was able to stand and move about even though there really wasn't much to see other than a large gray void. After selecting a random direction, I exited, purchased several balls of yarn, and returned. I then went in the direction I selected, unwinding the yarn behind me planning on choosing a different direction if I either hit a barrier or ran out of yarn without finding my sister's body. Shortly before I finished unwinding my last ball of yarn, I ran into something that had at the time been invisible. Shortly after I hit it, it revealed itself to be a small wooden door surrounded by several polished sticks. When I moved back to inspect this anomaly, I discovered that I could not move more than two paces in any direction. It was at this point that I knocked, hoping the owner of the door and the sticks would hear me." Genesis replied.

"Why did your family wait two decades to go looking for your sister's body?" Moody asked. The timing of the search was rather suspicious. He'd have to look this "Shinra Corporation" up as well.

"My "family" didn't go looking for her. They just buried an empty casket, told me she got eaten by a wild animal, and moved on." Genesis said with as much passion as the Veritaserum allowed. "I didn't learn how Ban died until I wandered through the Shinra Storage Facility looking for parts for my Dumbapple pie launcher and came across the machinery and the boxes of notes nearby. If I hadn't read those notes out of curiosity, I would never have learned."

"You mentioned something about wanting to die near her body. Why would you want to go and do something like that?" he asked remembering something the man had said. The timing of the man's search and his arrival at his trunk out of the hundreds of thousands out there had been a coincidence. True coincidences were extremely rare, but they happened sometimes, especially when magic itself decided to interfere with something. He hated coincidences, they made you unnecessarily over-paranoid and people laughed at you about them later.

"My parents allowed me to be used in an experiment before I was even born. Genetic information from an ancient that had been excavated from an ash layer from a volcanic eruption that had taken place two thousand years ago had been grafted onto my own while I was still in the womb. Other than being a little faster and stronger than was strictly normal I was seemingly ordinary, up until a few months ago that is. I didn't notice when things started going out of whatever balance I'd been maintaining at first, but one day I had some sort of an episode and attacked a man that had been my friend for years and my hero when I was a kid. I got injured in the ensuing fight, and things really started going downhill from there. I was informed that I was "degrading" and that there was little to nothing that could be done to halt the process." Genesis said.

"When I finally realized that my sanity was slipping bit by bit, I did things that relaxed me before - such as reading LOVELESS - to get a handle on myself. It was my best friend Angeal who suggested that I make the Dumbapple pie launcher we used to talk about when we were kids. It was when I was looking for parts for the launcher that I found the notes. Since I'll be dying after turning into some sort of monster soon anyways, I figured I may as well be with Banora Rose. She was one of the few people I cared about, and I don't want my friends to be forced to watch what's going to happen to me." Genesis continued.

Moody couldn't help but stare after he heard the man's explanation. Some idiot who had absolutely no idea what he was doing had tried to create an Augmented and messed up badly. There was no way in hell that he would leave the man as he was. He would have to contact that American Auror who'd helped out in the fight against Grindlewald back when he was a trainee and see if the man knew if there could be anything that could be done. If anyone knew, he would, considering the fact that he and his entire family were Augmented. If nothing could be done, at the very least, the Americans who had had experience with such things since the Great Banishment would be able to find a way to put the poor man out of his misery painlessly.

From what the man said, he believed that his sister was dead, but if he could come through someone's trunk there was a possibility that his sister had done so as well. Though he said he'd ask around to lure the man out, it looked like he would so the man had at least a chance at a little bit of peace of mind before he went if nothing could be done for him. There was even a small possibility that the man's sister was still alive, and having her around when the time came would at least be a small comfort.

"Son, can you tell me what your little sister looked like when she was lost?" he asked.

"Ban was about average size for a two year-old. She had fire red hair and grass green eyes. I have a picture of her in an inside pocket of my coat." Genesis said.

Moody moved over to where he had laid the coat when he had disarmed the man, after having idly noted the hooks that would be nearly invisible while they held his sword in place. He'd thought them odd, but sensible if the sword was used often - as it appeared to have been - as drawing the weapon out of a sheath would probably take the amount of time between life and death and then some.

In an inner pocket that was about chest level were several small objects. Ignoring the polished rock, the silver locket, the braided lock of silver hair, the beaded bracelet with a broken clasp into which a lock of black hair had been twined and what looked like a ticket stub from a muggle movie theater, he grabbed the square piece of paper with the words Genesis and Banora Rose on it and turned it over. It was a muggle photograph of a pair of red haired children. The boy who couldn't have been older than four was hugging a small girl. The girl was Lily.


	2. Chapter 2

When he was released from that whatever it was that the man had done to him and laid down on a couch covered in a rather eclectic collection of doilies - taken from the home of an old bat who kept calling the Aurors over a "stolen kneazle" that had turned out to have died several years earlier - Genesis' first impulse was to run. But where would he run to? The old man had disarmed him and could easily drop him before he reached his weapons or the trunk from which he could possibly find his way home, and he had no idea what lay outside the house's front door if anything. He thought of possibly using a spell on the man, but that would take preparation and energy he didn't seem to have at this point because his silent and almost desperate Heals, Healaras and Healagas hadn't lifted whatever it was that forced him to tell the man everything he wanted to know. If the man had asked for all of his secrets in that state, he would have spilled everything whether he wanted to or not. As it was he'd been forced to reveal things he hadn't wanted to because they were nobody's business but his own.

"Son," the old man who had captured him said. "I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your sister is dead. She died yesterday. She was killed by some lunatic that fancied himself a Dark Lord. The man killed her and her husband. They're trying to figure out how their son survived since from the looks of things, he was hit by the killing curse as well."

He didn't know what to think of this. He wasn't entirely certain that he should believe the old man, but that strange state that forced him to answer all of the man's questions hadn't prevented him from noticing things, especially after he'd used up all of his magic. The man's reaction when he had seen the photograph of him and his little sister was one of them. He had appeared to have been genuinely shocked.

The old man grabbed something off of the coffee table and handed it to him. It was an actual paper newspaper. **JAMES AND LILY POTTER DEAD, YOU-KNOW-WHO MISSING! **ran across the top of the paper in six inch high letters, beneath the six inch high letters was **Harry Potter Miraculously Survives! **in letters three inches high. Beneath this headline was something that could only be some sort of magic he didn't understand because there was no technology capable of embedding a video file into a piece of paper, which was what this was as he had discreetly tore a corner of it to check. Inside a square space were the moving figures of a man who greatly resembled Angeal's puppy and a woman holding a baby. The woman had fiery red hair of a shade that nearly matched his "mother's" - he refused to think of her in a real parental sense after he found out what she allowed to happen to him before he was even born - and bright green eyes that looked a great deal like those of his "father", but were well, greener. Other features also indicated that there was a strong possibility that this woman was indeed little Ban.

Surrounding the picture was a story that was written in one of the two trade languages that all SOLDIER operatives were required to learn (if they didn't know them already). The main gist of it was was that the woman who could be his sister and her husband had hid from the leader of a terrorist organization in order to protect their infant son. The friend of the family who had been entrusted with their location had given it to the very person they had been hiding from. Rather than send a subordinate, the leader whose identity everybody except him seemed to know showed up in person. He then cast a variant of DEATH on James Potter and his wife who really looked like she could be Ban the more he studied the picture. He tried the same curse on their son Harry who somehow evaded it and possibly even sent it bouncing back to its caster.

"As for your other problem" the old man said after giving him a few minutes to study the paper. "I know someone in America that might be able to help one way or another."

The next day, he found himself in a strange place wondering why he had agreed to come and fearing that something had been put in his water to ensure his compliance, as he'd refused to eat the food the old man whose name turned out to be Alastor Moody had given him. Moody was holding something out to him that he claimed was a sleeping potion and suggesting he take it. He was refusing since he knew that there was a strong possibility that the old man just wanted him unconscious so he wouldn't struggle when he finally betrayed him. He had proven himself untrustworthy when he knocked him out and put him in a state where he could be forced to reveal his secrets. He wasn't sure if he believed Moody's "Making sure you weren't a Death Eater" story or not. Last night, Moody had told him the story about the war that claimed the life of the woman who could possibly be his sister and showed him several newspapers that had been packed away in a dimensional pocket in yet another trunk after he'd contacted several people including the person who was supposed to "Help" him. While the story seemed true, he wouldn't put it past being a hoax orchestrated by Professor Hojo who had been trying to get him into his lab for a while now. Hojo was the sort of person who wouldn't hesitate in using his dead sister as bait.

"The Overland Express Floo was the best I could get on such short notice, and you really don't want to be conscious for the trip. It's bad enough that I have to be." Moody said as he held the bottle out to him. "I took the last of my supply of Anti-Nausea potion and didn't have time to brew more, so it's either this or me stunning you because I have absolutely no desire to be vomited on."

"Why would I vomit on you?" he asked, startled that the old man was actually giving him a choice or at the very least, the illusion of one.

"Due to the distance limitations of the Floo system, we have to take the long way around passing through the floo systems of several nations. We're going to pop over the channel into France, go across the continent from there, travel up through Siberia to well above the Arctic circle, hop over the Bering Strait into Alaska, go down through Alaska and Canada and eventually stop in Denver Colorado. The trip is six hours long, and we'll be spinning in circles the entire way. It is pretty much guaranteed you'll vomit if preventative measures aren't taken. I'd have preferred an International Portkey, but there is a three day waiting period up to prevent Death Eaters from using them to leave the country. I figured I'd get you to America as soon as possible since you don't know how stable your situation is and a delay could be the difference between fixing the problem and giving you a peaceful end." Moody replied.

"Why go all the way to this America place, couldn't I be treated here?" he asked, the distance to America had surprised him. He'd expected it to be much closer.

"Because, America's the only place that officially has experience treating your sort of problem, and they've had centuries of experience doing so." Moody explained patiently, as if he were talking to a particularly dim toddler.

"Officially? Centuries?" he asked. He hadn't questioned Moody about this before because he thought America was like the next town over or something, but instead he was going somewhere that was on an entirely different continent. It was either for that reason, or because whatever was ensuring his compliance was wearing off.

"America and Asia are about the only places where the Augmented are considered human or at the very least not looked down upon for being Augmented, and therefore the only places the Augmented would really want to live. They used to be somewhat revered in Africa and parts of the Pacific before the colonists moved in and took over. In Asia, Africa, and the Pacific such problems don't really crop up because the lines there were well established and have been around for, in some cases, well over a millennium or more with the youngest being roughly seven hundred years old. While there are some old lines in Europe, and the Americas, most of the lines of the Augmented in those regions were created during a rash of experimentation during the Fifteenth and Sixteenth centuries and several later independent and rather illegal experiments. In the early years of the Seventeenth Century a group of Purebloods called for the Augmented and their families to be "disposed of" because they "tainted" their lines and made themselves "something other than human". This movement gained popularity and many of the Augmented families were slaughtered. The Augmented soon began to fight back taking at least five normal wizards for every one of theirs that were taken. Realizing that a bloody war had been started and that normal wizards were quite likely on the losing side, a bunch of the Ministries or rather their equivalents at the time met to discuss the problem and find a solution. In 1625 it was decided that all of the Augmented would be banished from Europe. Wanting to bring an end to the bloodshed, the majority of the Augmented accepted this. Most of the Augmented ended up sailing to the Americas. A few have snuck back into Europe in the generations since." Moody replied.

"It is in these lines, many of which were created by complete amateurs, that most of the problems the Augmented have suffered cropped up. Over the generations, ways of fixing these problems were discovered and perfected. America now boasts seven clinics that treat the Augmented as well as victims of other experiments that couldn't be treated in their home countries for political reasons or because their home countries couldn't make heads or tails of the problem. Of the seven clinics, the one in Colorado is reputed to be the best." Moody continued.

"What exactly are the Augmented?" he asked. The man seemed to assume he was one or something similar, otherwise he wouldn't be taking or claiming to be taking him to a place that treated them.

"From what you told me, you are. The Augmented are those who have had the traits of certain magical creatures grafted into their line rather than having been bred in through direct mating and the descendants who have inherited those traits. First Generation Augmented have two human parents who have had the desired traits magically added to their sperm and eggs before they attempt to conceive, ensuring a child or children born with those traits. From what you have told me, you are a First Generation Augmented who'd been made so by some idiot that had more magic than brains. You're not supposed to add or attempt to add traits to an already growing fetus." Moody replied.

"Moody, party of two, you're up." called the man in orange robes and a rather strange looking triangular hat that had a green feather pinned to it who tended the fire through which several people had already vanished.

"Fuck. Wait a minute will you, I have to get my companion ready." Moody said as he reached for his wand.

So much for his little stalling tactic. His questioning the man to distraction while attempting to gain useful information as soon as he discovered he could do so had only been mildly effective. He'd managed to limit his choice from drink the potion or be stunned to be stunned. He tried to run, but didn't get more than two steps before he heard the old man say "Stupefy". The world then went black. He wasn't certain how long it stayed that way.

"...used a mild Confundus on him and it wore off earlier than expected." he heard Moody say.

"Why did you have to Confundus him in the first place?" a new voice said.

"He didn't trust me very much after I stunned him and dosed him with Veritaserum to make sure he wasn't a Death Eater." Moody replied. "Something he said while he was under indicated that he could turn dangerous very quickly, and there was no way in hell I was going to turn him loose on the general populace of wherever the hell he came from if that were the case, especially since it appears that he has been trained in combat."

"According to the initial scans, we've never seen the creature or being he's been crossed with before, but his problem is one that we have encountered before. Unfortunately, it's rather common in First Generationers who were born to those who had absolutely no idea what they were doing. Fortunately for him, you brought him here while it was still potentially fixable." the stranger said.

And so began his first day at the clinic where he was forced to drink dozens of nasty "potions" daily, was fed weird tasting food that was barely recognizable as such, had several spells that ranged from the mildly annoying to the extremely painful cast on him, and was forced to go to "Physical Therapy" where they made him work the muscles in the black wing that had mysteriously sprouted out of his back and learn how to retract the damn thing and call it up as needed (which was an extremely painful process). He was rather disappointed in himself when he quit trying to escape after the first week and a half. Resistance was apparently futile, especially when your captors have someone who's apparently part dragon if the wings were anything to judge by to knock you out of the air you rightly shouldn't be able to fly in considering the fact that you only have one wing. After nearly a month, the old man came to get him.

"They told me that you've stabilized and it's safe for you to go home, but you'll need annual examinations to make sure that there's no regression." Moody said. "I came to pick you up because, as far as I know the only chance of getting you back to wherever you came from seems to be my trunk. The only thing I can figure as to why both you and your sister showed up in my property and nobody else has complained of such occurrences is that it has to do with the modifications I did to the space expansion charm to create a stable expanded space within an expanded space when I made that wand compartment. I used something similar to make an extra hidden cupboard in my tent about a week before your sister showed up. Fortunately for your sister, it didn't lock since a locking charm would likely destabilize the expansion. People generally don't look for such things, because someone told them it was impossible. It isn't, it's just incredibly tricky, and apparently you run the risk of wanderers from another universe dropping by."

"Why should I go with you?" he asked. The old man would more than likely drop him in another unpleasant place rather than take him home like he said he was going to, unfortunately he didn't seem to have any other options. That didn't mean he would make it easy for the old man though.

"Other than the fact that you don't have anywhere else to stay, your discharge papers have already been signed, and all of the favors Smith owes me have been called in to get your treatment at no cost, no reason." Moody replied somewhat sarcastically.

The old man had him by the balls and he knew it. If he stayed here he'd be homeless, and as he had no local identification or verifiable credentials it would be impossible to find a job. He'd look like one of the beggars in the Sector 5 slums in less than a month. Unlike his best friend Angeal who'd grown up poor and spent half his spare time wandering the streets, he'd never really learned how to survive such a situation. Sighing, he gathered his clothes and the few belongings he had acquired during his stay. At least, he would be leaving this awful place.

"I figured that on the way home, we could make a brief stop at Lily's adoptive sister's place and visit your nephew. You wouldn't believe the effort I had to go through to finagle my way into being the brat's watcher. I now have an extra house that I don't need. What Dumbledore was thinking when he came up with the idea of leaving that squib Figg to watch the boy, I don't know." the old man said.

Fifteen minutes later, after a rather unpleasant trip by the "International Portkey" that looked suspiciously like a pornographic magazine that Moody had brought and chucked at the person in the room that was their destination who caught it and began to read it, and something that was called Side-along Apparition which strongly reminded him of the time a rather drunken Sephiroth had tried to Teleport them to another bar after the bartender had cut him off, they ended up in a small stand of trees in a park that was in the middle of a neighborhood full of houses that were virtually identical. From there, they walked to a street called Privet Drive, and up the walkway of a house that had a brass number 4 on the front door. The door was answered by a nervous looking woman who was about his age, maybe a couple of years older.

"Oh, thank God! You've found a blood relative of Lily's." the woman said sounding relieved. "I was going spare trying to figure out what to do. Vernon doesn't mind him so much while he's in the cupboard, but I can't keep him in there forever."


	3. Chapter 3

Alastor Moody didn't quite know he ended up sitting in the living room of Number 4 Privet Drive listening to Petunia Dursley's complaints while Genesis held and carefully examined the small boy he knew for a fact was the man's nephew, having tested the child and triple checked the results using three different tests that all had the same purpose while the man was at the clinic using hair and blood he'd taken from him while he was unconscious. The first thing that Genesis had noticed about the boy when he had been handed to him were his striking green eyes. Eyes that drew attention, just like his mother's. Instead of commenting on their beauty like most people, Genesis' reaction had surprised him. The man had looked downright horrified.

"Is there something wrong with his eyes?" he had asked. "They're just like his mother's were when I found her."

"They...The Procedure...Ban...But how did he?" the man had sputtered incoherently as he tried to get a grip on reality. Based on his reaction, the way his, Lily's and Harry's eyes seemed to practically glow in an attention grabbing manner wasn't naturally hereditary but the result of the experimentation that had been done on him and Lily.

"I think we had better get Harry checked out at the clinic." he had said the instant before Petunia came in with a tea tray that had what looked to be her best china on it. The woman was hoping to make a favorable impression for some reason. While Genesis was rather handsome and he was rather intimidating, he didn't think those were the reasons.

It was about ten minutes into the conversation that he realized what was going on. The woman was trying to convince a twenty-four year old bachelor with absolutely no parenting experience to take in a child. Namely one Harry Potter that she had taken in herself out of a sense of obligation towards family rather than out of love. How the hell Dumbledore had expected the blood wards to take in this place, he didn't know. The somewhat inaccurately named Blood Wards required either ties of blood or ties of love, and Harry had neither here. There was a faint something up that suggested that Harry's cousin liked him in a vaguely babyish fashion, but that was about it.

He seriously hoped that Petunia was playing up her husband's dislike of the boy, and his treatment of the child otherwise he'd be giving the man a serious talking to. A fifteen month old toddler should never receive more than one swat on the rump and that should only be reserved for times when the child had gotten into or tried to get into something that was very dangerous or potentially lethal. You were not supposed to spank a child for crying because he was hungry or his diaper needed to be changed.

Petunia's little spiel on how Harry would be unhappy here - that was if Vernon continued to allow him to stay - seemed to be working. Genesis was growing more and more tense with each new complaint or story of how Vernon had tried to sneak Harry off to the orphanage while her back was turned. He clutched Harry more protectively with each passing minute, examining him now for signs of abuse rather than what he might have inherited from whatever experiments had been done on Lily.

* * *

An hour and a half after he had arrived at #4 Privet Drive, Genesis found himself leaving with a small toddler and a growing sense of unease at his decision. While Harry shouldn't have to stay another minute in that house with that brute Vernon, the fact remained that it was only a possibility that he could get home and if he couldn't, he had nowhere to go. There was a good chance that he would end up homeless with a baby, and if he did manage to make it home, there was the fact that he would constantly be sent on missions that he might never return from, if he didn't get killed for "desertion" that is. If he did die, he was certain Angeal would take Harry in, but there was a strong possibility that his parents would sue for custody and win since they were "actually family". If that happened, it was near certain that Harry would be used as a test subject in whatever experiment the lab rats in the science department came up with.

"You did the right thing son, Harry needs to be with his family for several reasons and right now, you're all he's got." Moody said. "Let's head over to that white elephant I was forced to purchase and floo over to my place from there."

"Why didn't we just..." he started, wondering why they didn't floo over to Moody's second house instead of going through that drunken teleportation thing.

"Because, you're not supposed to Apparate with a child under three unless it's a dire emergency and no other options are available." Moody said, cutting him off.

With that, they went to a nearly identical street named Magnolia Crescent and entered a house that could be mistaken for the one they had just left. The place was pristine, unlike Moody's real abode which was bursting with piles of junk that ranged from tissue boxes to salt shakers. They then went to the fireplace where Moody briefly explained the Floo system before sending them through.

At the other end of the insanely dizzying ride, he found himself falling out of Moody's fireplace. He quickly rolled so as not to land on his nephew, who he carefully set down before emptying the contents of his stomach on Moody's living-room rug. Why were all of the forms of magical transportation around here extremely unpleasant?

"You're cleaning that up." Moody said the second after he stepped through.

* * *

Mrs. Smythe of #6 Privet Drive just happened to have been peering through her curtains when a strangely dressed red haired man and a rather grizzled looking old man whose features she couldn't properly remember left with Petunia's young nephew. Curious, she decided that it was time she paid her neighbor a visit.

An hour later, she left with a story she just had to tell everyone. Poor Petunia, to have that happen to her so soon after losing her sister...

Soon the tale of how Petunia lost custody of her nephew because the courts had decided to follow the letter of the boy's paternal grandfather's - an elderly widower who had been in rather frail health and died of a heart attack when he'd learned that his only son had died in a car accident - will rather than the spirit of it was the talk of the neighborhood.

According to what Mrs. Smythe had been told, the younger Potter's wills had named the elder Potter as first choice of guardian should anything happen to them. Apparently when the elder Potter had made his will, he had not known that Lily had been adopted when he specified that Harry be sent to live with his blood relatives (should he have custody of the boy for whatever reason) before anyone else was even considered. Harry had been staying with Petunia because it hadn't been known whether or not Harry actually had any living blood relatives as Harry was the last member of his father's family that through some serious bad luck had produced only one child per generation for the last seven generations.

A blood relative - who had been angered to learn of his half-remembered sister's abandonment when he'd spent most of his life believing her to have been dead and only recently learned otherwise - had been found by the private investigator that had been hired by the elder Potter's solicitor. He decided to take the child as Harry was pretty much the only family he had left, and there had been little to nothing Petunia could do about it.

* * *

Genesis sat contemplating what he had been told. He had noted that the lightening bolt shaped cut on Harry's forehead didn't seem to have healed properly, hadn't seemed infected, and didn't look like the injury he'd once had that didn't heal right because of the raw, unprocessed, Mako energy that had somehow seeped into it. He'd mentioned his observations to Moody who then left to get answers from a man called Dumbledore. Moody had returned an hour ago, rather shaken.

According to Dumbledore, the failed "Killing curse" had somehow caused a small piece of Voldemort's soul to break off and lodge itself in the wound on Harry's forehead. As the thing was somehow contained in the injury, was not taking possession of the child, and there didn't seem to be a way short of killing Harry to remove it, it was decided that it would be left alone.

As he tried to think of things that had once calmed him to get a handle on his whirling emotions regarding the situation, a memory came to him, a memory of a story he had read during those long peaceful and somewhat boring days spent in the library that had belonged to his "father" when Angeal had been unable to play with him because he'd somehow found a temporary job and could get money to help his mother. Why he was reminded of the legend of the ancient who had removed a dark spirit that had blighted the land it had tried to possess, he didn't know. He knew that at times he made some rather strange intuitive leaps that had ended up paying off, and wondered if this was one of them. There really wasn't anything to be done, but it wouldn't really hurt to try.

Coming to a decision, he started hunting for the necessary items or this world's equivalent of the necessary items he had remembered from the book. After finding what he needed or rather close to it amongst the junk and valuables that cluttered Moody's home, he made a clear space by kicking aside a large pile of women's purses and began drawing the array he vaguely remembered picturing when he had read the description in the story feeling slightly silly as he did so. Moody - who had asked him what he was doing when he found him rifling through his liquor cabinet looking for something similar to the distilled spirit of honey flowers described in the story and settling on an Amaretto when he found it to be the only thing in there that wasn't a type of whiskey - watched as he drew. When he finished drawing, he began to set up the necessary items, placing Harry in the middle of the array he had drawn, feeling even sillier as he did so.

At the end of the little ritual, there was a strange screaming noise as a misty thing with a rather ugly looking face rose from Harry's scar and vanished with a pop, presumably headed to the Lifestream to be healed as that was what the ancient hero had prayed would happen to the malevolent spirit that had attacked his homeland. Both he and Moody stared at the spot the mist had vanished from in shocked amazement.

"It worked. I didn't expect it to, but it actually worked." he said in amazement as Moody promptly started running to another room.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"To get writing materials and a pensive." Moody said.

* * *

Moody watched Genesis shiver slightly as they walked through the doors of the Archibald Bagnold Clinic for the Treatment of Rare and Unusual Magical Maladies, obviously remembering his own treatment here. This time they were there for Harry. The director of the clinic had been happy to examine Harry at no cost after he'd learned that the boy had been examined by a retired Unspeakable rather than an actual healer after the incident that had left him an orphan before he was shunted off to the muggle world. Otherwise, he wasn't certain how he would have been able to come up with the enormous consultation fee much less any of the fees for whatever treatments Harry might need as he couldn't ask Dumbledore because the man would throw one hell of a fit if he ever discovered he'd taken Harry out of the country. He'd really lucked out with Genesis because the clinic took in charity cases on rare occasions, and his Auror friend had been able to convince the director to take him on as one somehow when he'd called in every last one of the favors that the man had owed him.

He wasn't sure he liked the look on the healer's face when she raced out of the room after examining Harry's scar. It was possible that the exorcism that Genesis had done hadn't worked as they thought it had. When the healer returned ten minutes later, she had two senior healers, the clinic director and three out of breath American Unspeakables with her. All of them took turns scanning Harry.

"So that's how..." one of the Unspeakables said sounding amazed.

"What's how what?" Genesis asked.

"Let's just say that whatever it was that allowed Harry Potter to survive the killing curse will probably never happen again." the Unspeakable replied.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Lily Potter called on the Light Aspect of Death itself to save her child. For whatever reason, Death heard her and complied." the Unspeakable said.

The healer who was first examining Harry must have had Unspeakable training at one point if she was able to pick up on the fact that Harry had been touched by Death. He had known an Unspeakable who had studied the mysteries of Death. The man had once said that there was a certain something that was either Dark or Neutral depending on the conditions under which the heart had stopped that lingered around a person whose heart had stopped and had been restarted by either magical or muggle means for about a day or two. He was starting to get theories about why there was a certain Light something with Death's signature around Harry's scar and how it related to the exorcism Genesis had conducted.

"Light Aspect of Death?" Genesis asked.

"Everything either has a Light and a Dark aspect or is part of the Light or the Dark, including Death." he explained. "The Light Aspect of Death, or Merciful Death is depicted as a woman in the few drawings of her there are. The Dark aspect, or Cruel Death is depicted as a male. The depiction of Death that even the Muggles recognize - the genderless skeleton in black robes wielding a scythe - is the Middle Death which is both Light and Dark, and neither. It is more commonly known as Inevitable Death."

"So, he was saved from death by Death?" Genesis asked.

"Basically." he replied. He'd discuss his theories about the residue of Death around Harry's scar with Genesis later, when they were alone. The last thing he needed was Unspeakables experimenting on both Genesis and Harry. If they tried to get Harry they would be unable to, as with any minor they needed the Guardian's permission and he had a strong feeling that Genesis would only give it over his dead body. If they got Genesis first however...

* * *

He didn't know exactly how they had gotten away without the Unspeakables trying to take Harry and/or Genesis, but they had. After a long international flight on a muggle aeroplane, and a trip through the floo that Genesis vomited into a bucket he'd left by the fireplace at the end of which, they were back home.

After a discussion about his theory about the way Harry may have been touched by Merciful Death, the topic moved around to what would become of Harry in the future. It was agreed that Genesis should take Harry home with him if he was able to as that would be an excellent defense against those with ill intentions towards the boy in this world as it would become virtually impossible to get at him. If Genesis was unable to get home, there was always the second house, and he could be repaid for the things he and Harry needed later out of Harry's trust when the time came. He was uncertain as to whether he would be able to get Genesis muggle identification as the last wizard that didn't already have it by being Muggleborn or a Half-blood who had tried this decade had failed. It had been easy a hundred years ago, heck it had been easy twenty years ago, but now if a form was out of place or looked wrong somehow, there would be an interview with the local constables that one would much rather avoid. Getting Wizarding identification was downright impossible once you passed schooling age.

"They are going to expect him to return to the wizarding world to attend Hogwarts when he turns eleven." he said. Ten years. Harry would be safe, and it would be ten years before the wizarding world started panicking when it was revealed that Harry was missing. Petunia's demands that all wizardkind stay away from her and his being appointed Harry's watcher had fortunately ensured that.

"If I can get back, I'll deal with it then. If not, there would be no reason to." Genesis said, looking down at the boy who was nestled amongst cushions and blankets on the floor a safe distance away from the fire.

* * *

He had no idea where he was. There had been incredible pain, a period of darkness, and more pain, now he was somewhere that was very peaceful. There was someone with the voice of an angel telling him to rest until the rest of him arrived and he could be healed. He was very tired, and rest sounded good. He briefly wondered where the rest of him was as he fell asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

Genesis said goodbye to Moody as he shifted the diaper bag the man had gotten him on one shoulder and made sure his nephew was secure in his basket. Both knew that the goodbye probably wouldn't last longer than a couple of minutes, but he had to make at least one attempt at getting home before resigning himself to staying here, and if there was even a small chance that he would be successful, there was no way in hell he would leave his nephew behind. Both knew that the goodbye could be permanent because there was no guarantee that he would ever find his way back with the wand he had been given and the locating spell he'd been taught, because spells of the wanded kind never seemed to work properly in "Expanded" spaces.

After carefully stepping down into the trunk, he began to slide his way through the open door of Moody's spare wand compartment pulling his sword, the diaper bag and his nephew's basket in after him. Once he and Harry were through and everything was secure, he moved forward one...two...three steps.

"I think this really might be goodbye." He called back before he took a fourth and then a fifth step and started following his yarn back home.

After a half hour of walking when his eagerness to be home began to wear off and his rational mind started poking through, he wondered if he'd made the right decision. It was almost certain that someone turned the machine off and that his yarn line would end at a blank space where the opening had been. If that was the case, he would be forced to either walk all the way back to Moody's trunk or wander until he ran into something else. If he was really really lucky, he'd pop up in some hapless SOLDIER operative's backpack giving the poor sod a heart attack while he was wandering. Knowing his luck though, he'd probably find himself in some entirely different universe that also used dimensional pockets. He'd would follow the yarn until he reached the end though, there was still hope of going home while he did and it kept him from having to make more plans until later.

After what seemed like days during which he'd had to stop and feed Harry the magical instant formula that he seemed to hate several times and change his diapers a few times he reached the end of the yarn. Instead of finding a blank space where the opening should be as he'd pretty much been expecting, he found the opening and a very surprised lab rat standing there staring at him as if he'd just seen a ghost.

"Y-y-you're back!" the man stammered before turning and racing through the opening.

He raced after him to make sure the man didn't decide to turn the machinery off to prevent his return or something. It would be just his luck for that to happen when he was only a few feet away from home. Once he reached the opening, he dove through headfirst, rolling so he didn't land on his nephew. It took him a few seconds to register that he'd actually made his way through and that he was back home in his own universe where he belonged. Once he'd finally processed these facts, he stood up, checked that Harry was okay, then brushed himself off.

"Um, exactly how much time passed for you while you were gone?" the lab rat who had probably planned on leaving him in the dimensional void asked while looking at Harry curiously.

"About a month, why?" he asked.

* * *

Zack Fair did squats to release some of the nervous energy that had been building up during the long period of inactivity he had been going through while he waited impatiently for another mission. For some strange reason he had always done squats when he was feeling jittery, antsy, or merely bored and couldn't think of anything else to do. After the thirtieth squat, he turned to his fellow SOLDIER Second Class Kunsel who had stood nearby watching him - and who was wearing the purple uniform he'd be wearing if he hadn't "accidentally" dropped his into a vat of indigo dye - and complained about the missions or rather lack thereof.

"Didn't you hear, Genesis vanished without a trace like a month or so ago and supposedly took a bunch of Seconds and Thirds with him. They're redoing all of the psych profiles to make sure they don't hand an important mission out to someone who's just going to desert in the middle of it." Kunsel said. "Personally I think that Genesis' "Desertion" is a load of malarky considering the fact that the last time anyone could really say they saw them he was tinkering with one of the machines in storage, some long abandoned project in expanding the dimensional pockets we keep our stuff in if I recall. Why anyone would want to keep more than ninety-nine of a particular object, I don't know."

"It would be useful if I could carry more of that Ether stuff. Using Materia takes alot out of me, and I run through it almost faster than I do a roll of toilet paper. Come to think of it, I probably should keep my own emergency supply of toilet paper like Angeal does." He said. He was going to ask more about the machine Genesis was seen tinkering with - a First getting sucked into one of the numerous experiments in the building because he'd arrogantly messed with something he didn't understand was just too funny, really deserting would actually have caused less damage to the man's reputation and that was probably why that story had been put out to explain his absence - when his cell phone/pocket computer rang. He quickly answered it.

"Alright!" he said. "Angeal just called. I'm supposed to meet with him and Director Lazard in the Briefing Room to get a mission assignment. See ya!"

"Don't forget to write!" Kunsel called after him as he raced towards the Briefing Room.

* * *

Angeal watched as his student raced off to prepare for a combat mission to Wutai like the overexcited puppy he often compared him to. Goddess, he missed that terrier and Zack was a rather poor replacement, though he had grown on him in the time they spent training together. If he ever found the creature that ate Lazerman The King Of The Abyss, it would be one of the few things he risk wear, tear and rust on his buster sword over.

He was torn from his musings after a few moments when a familiar ginger haired figure in a red leather coat waltzed in carrying an over-sized picnic basket and what looked like it might be a diaper bag complete with a deformed yellow Chocobo on the front.

"Hi Angeal, I'm back. What did I miss while I was gone?" Genesis asked as he set the basket down on the table next to one of the computer consoles. "Oh, Hello Director Lazard."

"Where the hell have you been man? A bunch of Seconds and Thirds ditched about a month ago, claiming that you were leading them." He said. He had almost believed them at one point because his friend had been acting really weird before he left. He knew he shouldn't have, but...

"You remember Banora Rose?" Genesis asked.

"What the hell does the Queen of the Dumbapple Festival have to do with the price of tea in Nibelheim? And besides, the Dumbapple Festival's not for several months yet." he yelled. It seemed that his friend had really gone insane.

"Not that Banora Rose, my little sister Banora Rose." Genesis said looking somewhat upset.

"The one that died when we were like four?" he asked as Lazard used the intercom to summon Sephiroth. He remembered the child that tagged along after them once when they had escaped their parents to explore the village.

"I came across some files when I was wandering about Storage Facility 13 looking for spare parts for a project I was working on." Genesis said.

"Ah yes, the dumbapple pie launcher. It's been your lifelong dream to complete it and use it in the best prank ever." he said recalling the plans they had made as children. He'd jokingly suggested to Genesis that he build it because the man had been wandering about at two in the morning looking for something to do. Much to his surprise, his friend actually took him up at his suggestion.

"Long story short, my sister didn't get eaten by a flying monster like the one that took Lazerman like we thought. My "Parents" allowed her to be used in an experiment to see if you could stick a living object in a multidimensional carrying pocket and have it come out alive. All of the animals that had been used before had returned without ill effect except for the time they stuck a baby chocobo in and got a strange masked creature with black rings on its tail back. Human experimentation was the final phase. They sent my sister in and didn't get her back due to an "equipment malfunction"." Genesis said.

"So you fixed the problem and got her back? Is she in the basket?" he asked, looking at the basket with renewed interest. This was amazing, twenty years in a dimensional pocket and Genesis' sister was still two. Usually those crappy tasting potions had to be changed out every six weeks and Ether every eight due to either possible spoilage or decreased efficiency. Maybe things worked differently for living things like humans.

"No. Shortly after Ban was put into the storage pocket she somehow wandered into the universe where the ring tailed creature had come from or one just like it. She then managed to pop out of someones tent on the other side. The man who owned the tent didn't want to be accused of kidnapping considering the fact that he had committed several acts of thievery recently due to a spell that had turned him into a kleptomaniac and feared he would get a heavier sentence if found with a child that didn't belong to him as well as his "ill gotten gains", so he dumped her in an orphanage belonging to members of the "Muggle" society. She was adopted by a family called Evans a month later when they visited the orphanage after they found they couldn't have more children due to complications with the birth of their own and named Lily to go along with the flower theme that was traditional amongst females in their family." Genesis said.

"How do you know all this?" he asked as he paused in his journey towards the basket that Director Lazard was now staring at intently as he awaited Sephiroth's arrival. The poor guy was going to have to race over from his apartment where he'd been catching up on sleep before he was sent back to Wutai. Fortunately for him, he lived nearby.

"I fixed the machine. I ended up popping out of a trunk belonging to the same man. It seems that some modifications he'd made to the space expanding charms on his belongings that had them had provided a back door into that universe. The paranoid bastard was a member of the local law enforcement as well as a kleptomaniac. How he could continue working in his field with a peg leg and a glass eye, I don't know. He kept track of Ban in case her family came looking for her." Genesis said. "Not that it mattered in the end. I showed up a day late and about a hundred Gil short."

"Huh?" he said. Not the most eloquent of responses considering the sad look that had come across his friend's face.

"She died the day before I arrived. Some madman killed her and her husband. Their kid somehow managed to survive with only a small cut though." Genesis said as he gestured towards the basket.

"So, that's your sister's kid in the basket?" he asked, as he finally looked inside seeing its contents for the first time. There was a small toddler somewhere between a year and a year and a half in age with spiky black hair and green eyes that glowed like they had been infused with Mako energy dressed in a blue one piece outfit inside.

"Yeah. The headmaster of a school she attended as a child dumped him on her adoptive sister's doorstep without a by your leave. Left him out half the night in what had to be the middle of winter based on how freaking cold it was outside when I visited the place. The Petunia woman was happy to learn he had blood family. She said something about a protection that either depended on ties of love or ties of blood. While she tried to keep him to protect him because the ties she had with Lily who had been her sister since she was little, her husband had been giving her a hard time. Apparently her husband didn't want him around after he found out that he and his aunt weren't related by blood and therefore didn't feel that they were obligated to care for him. She'd had to grab him out of the car a few times before the man could haul him off to the orphanage, before she blackmailed him into letting him stay. The woman's husband was a right bastard, and there was no way in hell I was going to leave any nephew of mine in his care." Genesis said.

"You do realize that what you did was extremely foolhardy and that you ran the risk of being unable to return and that bringing the child back was a rather foolish move on your part. I reviewed the files on that particular project while you were gone. While the ring tailed creature that came through in lieu of the Chocobo did manage to live a few years after it came here there was no way of knowing its potential lifespan and therefore determining if being placed in a universe in which it didn't belong had shortened it considerably." Lazard said.

"You're lucky I've decided to allow you to return to your duties in SOLDIER as your activities have been deemed not to be treacherous or to have endangered the company. In fact they seem to have opened a whole new branch of experimentation. I will send out a notice that you left due to a family emergency and that news of your "desertion" was propaganda put up by anti-Shinra activists to demoralize our troops in Wutai. I will ask you to carefully consider what you plan to do with your nephew since we don't know that your sister's longevity would work both ways and because employment in SOLDIER isn't conducive to raising children." Lazard continued

"I know that what I did was stupid. I wasn't really thinking straight at the time. Several revelations amongst other things had hit me all at once and Ban was the last straw. The fact is that return is possible though. My nephew's being able to return to his home universe would most likely negate the potential damage, though I doubt it would cause any more damage than if he were left with those Dursleys. Their son is extremely obese and he is only a month older than Harry. Who knows what shape Harry would have been in one, five, or even ten years from now if I left him there. There is also the fact that Vernon Dursley could've ended up having his way, and Harry would have been placed in an orphanage. From what I've been told, those places really aren't well run and they don't have the same child safety laws they do here. There is also the fact that Harry has one parent from either universe so technically he could be considered to belong to both and as he was conceived naturally, and is apparently in good health according to the doctors that examined him after the exorcism...." Genesis said in the tone he recognized from when they were eight and he had come up with a logical argument for why he should be allowed to have a sandcat despite the fact that sandcats were larger than he was at the time and extremely dangerous to boot.

"Exorcism?!" Director Lazard exclaimed, cutting off Genesis' speech about why he should be allowed to keep his nephew, at least temporarily.

"The bastard who killed my sister tried to stick a piece of his soul in Harry's head. Naturally, I removed it." Genesis said.

"Who's Hairy?" Sephiroth asked having just arrived from his apartment.

"Genesis' nephew." he said. "Long story short, some scientists were messing around with the dimensional pockets we keep our stuff in and lost Genesis' little sister when they tried to see if you could keep a human in one. The reason Genesis has been gone is because he tried to get his sister back only to discover she ended up in another universe where she grew up, married, had a kid, and got murdered by a psycho. Genesis decided to bring her kid back because the people he was left with were unfit to take care of him."

"Oh, then "Hairy" is a normal name where the boy comes from?" Sephiroth asked.

"Yes, from what I've been told it's usually short for Harold but it wasn't so in this case. His parents just named him Harry according to what was on his birth certificate I was given. Someone at the clinic I took him to to be checked out at had suggested that he might have been named after someone called Houdini considering the fact that he escaped death." Genesis replied.

* * *

Sephiroth listened to the debate between Genesis and Director Lazard with interest. Once it was established that he wasn't needed for the purpose for which he'd been called in, namely bringing Genesis back under control if he had another one of his "episodes" such as the training session a few months ago when he had gone completely psycho, he had decided to stand by and watch.

Over the course of an hour, Genesis had not only successfully argued that he should be allowed to keep his nephew, but had somehow managed to wrangle an extra allowance for the child's needs and convinced the director to hire someone to watch the child while he was on duty.

Genesis was back. The silver tongued devil who could charm the legendary Ice Queen out of her panties and convince his friends that BASE jumping off the top of the tower was a good idea (admittedly they had been drunk at the time) was back. Whatever it was that had been driving his friend and comrade in arms towards madness seemed to be gone for now. He hoped that it would stay that way.


	5. Chapter 5

Genesis smiled as he watched his nephew walk onto the stage to receive his diploma seven years early. He was proud of the boy, but he had absolutely no idea what he was going to do with him for the seven years and two months until he turned eighteen and joined SOLDIER as he had planned. He could sent him to the local university, but if he did there would be little chance of him ever interacting with children his own age. Considering what Sephiroth was like when he and Angeal first met him face to face...Leaving him in the Shinra building's daycare was no longer an option, and he hadn't been allowed to leave the boy to his own devices since the incident with that unfortunate Lab Tech's Alchemy Master's Project when he was three. He was glad that he hadn't been forced to pay for the repairs to the building's plumbing, waste processing and filtration system when the stone Harry had flushed down the toilet reacted with the minute amounts of Mako energy that ended up in every SOLDIER operative's waste and had turned all of the human waste and toilet paper in the central processing area into gold, creating a massive blockage that caused a massive flood in the subbasement where the processing center was housed and backed up every toilet in the building. The lesson learned that day was that Philosopher's Stones and Mako infused poop don't mix. That, and don't leave your Master's projects where a toddler can get its hands on it.

"It's a pity he isn't of legal drinking age." Angeal said after pretending to wipe a tear from his eye as Harry walked off the stage.

"He's bad enough already, there's no need to add alcohol to the mix. As it is, I don't know what I'm going to do with him." he said.

"What do you mean? After High School comes college for the lucky bastards that can afford it. Considering the fact that President Lazard is fond of him, it's a sure bet that Harry is going to be one of those lucky bastards." Angeal said.

"I want him to interact with children his own age so he doesn't end up like Sephiroth was when we first met him or worse Hojo, but if he goes to college there is little chance of that happening." he replied.

"Why don't you send him to that school that your friend Moody was nattering on about the last time we visited, you know the one that would panic if he didn't show up. There's bound to be kids his own age there." Angeal said.

"You know, that's not a bad idea." he said as Harry returned to his seat.

* * *

Albus Dumbledore sighed as he penned the final draft of a letter he almost chose not to write. He'd carefully weighed the pros and cons of his plan of action since he'd learned what Quirrel had brought back with him from his trip to Albania. The risk was great, but so too would be the potential reward. He just wished that the bait for the trap wasn't so valuable or the trap itself so potentially dangerous for innocent bystanders. Unfortunately, the best traps are the ones that don't look like traps at all.

While he had reservations about allowing Quirrel back into the school now that he knew what he was, he chose to follow the old adage "Keep your friends close, and keep your enemies closer".

After carefully sealing the letter with both magic and his personal seal, he summoned Fawkes.

"Please take this to Nicholas and wait for a reply." he said to the phoenix as he handed him the letter.

As he watched his feathered companion vanish in a burst of flame, he wondered again if he had made the right decision. On the one hand, a school full of children was no place to lay a trap. On the other though, there was the possibility that he would be able to get rid of Tom Riddle once and for all.

* * *

Richard and Jean Granger listened to what the woman named McGonagall said with growing interest. Hermione was due to graduate at the end of the month. They had wanted to wait until she was older and a little more mature before they sent her to university to give her a few years to just be a kid, but they knew that Hermione would not be happy sitting around with nothing to do. They had torn themselves up agonizing over what would be best for their daughter and had been unable to decide. This however seemed to be the answer to their problems. Hermione would be in the school environment she so enjoyed and would be able to study a subject that was entirely new to her with children her own age who were also starting out, and she would also be given those few precious years to just be a child before she headed off to attend university with others of her own age group instead of much older than her.

Nodding to each-other, Richard and Jean decided to accept Professor McGonagall's offer as this would be the best path for their daughter. Money would be no object when it concerned their daughter's development and emotional well-being. It wasn't as if they couldn't afford it. The look of rapt interest on Hermione's face as she watched her future Deputy Headmistress levitate the coffee table told them that it would be well worth it.

* * *

Neville Longbottom hummed a cheerful tune as he wrote down his latest observations on the cross polination experiment he had started that Spring. Hopefully he would have a successfully flutterby/honeysuckle hybrid by next year. Life with his grandmother was often lonely, but as long as he had his greenhouse, his herbology books, and those kids that his grandmother said should be his friends weren't around to pick on him, he was relatively content.

Later this year he would be attending Hogwarts, and he was uncertain how he should feel about that. On the one hand the brats that would pick on him when his grandmother wasn't looking were going to be there along with hundreds of other people he didn't know. On the other however, the Hogwarts greenhouses were famous and the Herbology Professor was world renown in the field. He also wanted the chance to make some of the plant based potions he had been reading about, and he wouldn't be able to do that here because his grandmother kept him well away from any fire that wasn't for flooing purposes, most sharp objects, and potions ingredients that weren't growing in the ground or the small pond nearby.

* * *

Nicholas Flamel jumped in surprise when Fawkes the phoenix appeared right in front of him in a burst of flame. He hadn't been expecting anymore mail this month as all of the periodicals they subscribed to had arrived on the first as usual. Their subscription to the Daily Prophet had lapsed years ago. All of their bills were automatically dealt with by their solicitor who forwarded anything he deemed important to them on the first along with their journals and magazines.

"What was that noise dear?" Pernelle called from the next room.

"Fawkes was delivering a letter from young Albus." Nicholas said as he took the letter from the bird and opened it.

At first he had thought Albus was joking, but it would seem he was dead serious.

If he hadn't secured that Unbreakable Vow from his former apprentice a long time ago he wouldn't have even considered wasting the time to laugh in his face, much less hand over the Philosopher's Stone. However, if it meant getting rid of that upstart bastard who had killed the only family they were willing to associate with in recent generations, such a temporary loan would be well worth it.

While he liked the security of having the stone at hand or as near to at hand as it could get in its vault at Gringotts, the fact was that he and Pernelle could go up to ten years without the Elixer of Life - which unfortunately had a rather short shelf life - before their bodies would fall apart. A year or less would not be a problem.

He would have to discuss this with Pernelle though. He was reasonably sure that she would agree as she had been rather fond of Gideon and Fabian Prewett.

* * *

Harry grinned as his Uncle Genesis and "Uncle" Angeal and "Aunt" Aerith came up to congratulate him. "Uncle" Sephiroth had been unable to come since today was his annual psych eval. He'd been attending them religiously since the day he had that psychotic break and started torching some town in the ass end of nowhere called Nibelheim while he was there to root out some terrorists who had threatened to blow up a nearby reactor. Fortunately, "Uncle" Angeal, "Uncle" Zack, and Zack's friend Cloud were there to stop him and nudge him back on the path towards sanity. "Uncle" Zack was currently on duty as were most of Uncle Genesis's other friends, and therefore couldn't make it.

While he was briefly saddened that he didn't have friends of his own to celebrate this day with him, he decided not to let that ruin it for him. His uncle was here as was his favorite "Aunt", and that was enough.


	6. Chapter 6

Genesis toed the large pile of gold in disappointment. He had hoped that Harry would have money to burn after his schooling was finished since both Moody and the representative from Harry's new school had both said that the Potters had been loaded, but it looked as if they probably would be unable to cover his school supplies for all seven years, much less tuition.

He had a sinking feeling that the pile was gold all the way down, which meant that there was an estimated five, maybe six thousand Gil worth of gold there. The small silver and bronze piles looked somewhat promising. If they conserved those, Harry should be fine for a while.

Sighing, he scraped up a large amount of small change from the gold pile and carefully measured a couple handfuls of the silver and bronze coins.

"We'll have to buy alot of your stuff second hand, but you should be fine." he said as he handed the bag to his nephew as it was his money and he was competent enough to manage it reasonably.

The large man named Hagrid who was going to be guiding them to the best shops for school supplies since Alastor was at work bristled angrily.

"Here now, I won' have you cheatin'..." Hagrid started to yell.

"You wouldn't happen to be from Gaia would you?" the Goblin cut across Hagrid's tirade. How the hell the Goblin even knew of Gaia, he didn't know.

His expression at the question had apparently been enough of an answer for the Goblin however.

"You'll have to reverse your thinking about currency here." the Goblin said, looking as if it wanted to roll its eyes but knew it would get seriously reprimanded if he did so.

He paused a moment as he considered the Goblin's statement. It took a while to dawn on him.

"You mean that gold is worth _more_?" he said, incredulous. Harry seemed to share his views, as he was looking at the massive pile of gold in disbelief. What they both had thought to be a massive pile of practically useless pocket change was actually a fortune. They apparently reached the same conclusion at the same time if Harry's grin was any indication. The next time they were here, they were so going to cash in the change jar and whatever they could scrounge from beneath the couch cushions.

"And people wondered why we secured an Unbreakable Vow from Flamel preventing him from creating another Philosopher's stone, teaching any of his students how to manufacture one, or allowing any of his students to reverse engineer his." the Goblin grumbled.

&!&!&

Angeal grinned as he waved the train off. Practically the whole crowd had come to see Harry off, including the puppy and his wife. The puppy's brat ran after the train yelling goodbye to his "Aniki", on the heels of a red haired girl that looked to be a few years older than him who had apparently had the same idea.

The Puppy loved Harry almost as much as if he were his. For a while, he'd been convinced he was his. That had been one of his better practical jokes if he did say so himself. It probably wouldn't have worked if Zack hadn't been out of the office gossip loop for a while thanks to that mission to Wutai which had fortunately occupied all of his attention when Genesis returned...

_He and Sephiroth looked down at the strange newspaper that contained the only picture Genesis had of of his sister at an age older than two. There was a moving picture of Banora holding the baby Genisis had brought back while a man who was presumably her husband held her on the front page beneath the headline __**POTTERS KILLED, YOU-KNOW-WHO VANISHES!**_

_"Genesis' parents sucked at naming things - I should know, I let his dad name my dog - but she really could have been a Banora Rose, and probably for several years running." he said._

_"Other than the glasses and the eye color, that husband of hers could have been a dead ringer for that puppy of yours." Sephiroth commented with a mischievous look in his eye._

_"No. We are not using Genesis' nephew in a prank. He's just lost his sister." he said._

_"All the more reason he'd need a good laugh. The poor guy's been under a great deal of stress lately what with his recovery from his condition, having to take care of a baby, and training to get back into top form." Sephiroth said smirking evilly._

_Five minutes later:_

_Zack looked at him in confusion as he walked into the training room carrying a baby. _

_"Hey Angeal, what's with the kid?" the "puppy" asked._

_"It came here express delivery all the way from Gongaga along with a note from your mother saying that she was very disappointed in you." he replied, barely holding in his laughter as he handed Harry over to his often overeager student._

_"What?" Zack said, taking the child from him, looking uncertain about what he should do with it, much less how to hold it._

_As soon as he set the baby in his arms, he left. As soon as he left, the baby started crying. He had a sneaking suspicion as to why and thought it would be more interesting to let the puppy deal with it. Besides, it was beneath a SOLDIER 1st Class to change diapers. Genesis excepted of course._

_Meanwhile, in the Security Office:_

_Sephiroth, and Genesis laughed their asses off as they watched the monitors that displayed the security footage for the SOLDIER floor. Zack's pathetic attempts at rocking Harry to calm him down were more likely to make him sick than quiet him._

_"You know, you're better to be around now that you aren't reciting passages of LOVELESS at anything that moves." Sephiroth said. _

_"Don't remind me. It's my favorite epic and the best play of all time, but..." Genesis started._

_"Yeah." he said slightly sadly, having entered as Sephiroth had made his comment. Genesis would natter on about Loveless and the Goddess on occasion before the "incident", that had been why he'd found his impromptu recitations only slightly bizarre, rather than a sign of his declining condition._

_"So, how long are you going to leave my nephew in the puppy's care?" Genesis asked as he watched Zack continue trying to get young Harry to stop crying and becoming more and more panicked with each passing second._

_"We have two hours before we have to leave for our assignment, so I'll retrieve him in an hour and fifty minutes." he replied, smirking. "But I think I'll let him think the kid's his for the next week or so."_

_Meanwhile, on the SOLDIER floor:_

_Zack dashed out of the training room carrying the screaming child. He apparently didn't know what to do with it. _

_Upon spotting one of the guys who ran security and occasionally went on missions as cannon fodd...er, tactical support, he raced over in an apparently increasingly desperate attempt to get help to get the kid to stop crying._

_"Hey you! Er..." Zack said as he got within a few feet of the man guarding the entrance to the Materia Room._

_"Cloud, sir." the soldier said._

_"Do you know anything about babies?" Zack asked._

_"A little. I used to earn extra spending money by babysitting my neighbors' kids." Cloud said._

_"Um, do you know how to get this one to stop crying?" he asked as he handed the baby over to Cloud for him to inspect._

_"He needs his diaper changed." Cloud said after briefly sniffing the child that had been handed to him._

_"How do you do that?" he asked._

_Five minutes later, in the security office:_

_Sepheroth, Genesis and Angeal laughed until they almost pissed themselves as they watched Zack frantically plead with one of the receptionists at the front entrance in his search for a fresh diaper. _

_"Do you think I should have given him the diaper bag?" he asked._

_"Nah, let's watch him sweat it out." Sephiroth said as they watched Zack run into the Exhibit Room after a woman with three children, one of whom was in a stroller._

_They couldn't help but laugh as Zack waved the diaper in the air victoriously before he raced towards the elevator. They laughed even harder when they saw the look on Zack's face when he saw the contents of Harry's less than fresh diaper and tried pawning the rest of the job off on the guard he'd run into earlier._

Cloud - who was quite willing to babysit Harry when he wasn't on duty so long as he eventually got paid - had sort of become one of the guys after that even though he was more Zack's friend - and therefore a viable pranking target - than theirs.

Once the train had fully vanished from the platform, he turned to Genesis who was staring in the direction in which the train had went and indicated that it was time to go. They turned away from the platform, with the rest of the group which consisted of Sephiroth, Zack and Aerith and their boy, Cloud and his longtime fiancee Tifa, and Reno. They all probably wouldn't have gotten the day off if President Lazard hadn't had a soft spot for the boy who had inadvertently helped him take his half brother Rufus' position as Vice President before old man Shinra had a heart attack during a "session" with the Queen Bee over in Wall Market.

&!&!&

On September 1st, Nicolas and Pernelle Flamel had been indulging in their favorite vice, namely sloth. It had been around noon when the hunger pangs finally forced Nicholas from his pleasant rest to seek sustinence. When Pernelle arrived ten minutes later, she found her dear husband frowning into his cereal bowl clearly puzzling over something.

"Pernelle darling, did you add something to my cereal?" Nicholas asked apprehensively.

"No, it's your usual Raisin Bran like it has been for every breakfast for the last ten years. Why?" she replied, realizing that Nicholas feared that she was upset with him again and tried to poison him like she had three hundred years earlier.

"It's just different somehow." Nicholas said frowning at his bowl and cautiously taking another bite.

Pernelle grabbed a spoon and scooped out a small portion of the contents of her husband's bowl and ate it.

"You're right, it is different." she said.

Both Nicolas and Pernelle spent that afternoon puzzling over the new mystery after testing revealed that neither the milk nor the cereal were spoiled, and that there weren't any contaminants that should cause concern.


	7. Chapter 7

Harry had wandered the train looking for a compartment. He had attempted to sit with a blond boy who was accompanied by a pair of bodyguards in the making, but the boy looked him up and down from the top of his Midgar Chocobos cap that he'd worn to hide his scar so he wouldn't get mobbed by weirdo wizards - like the ones who had swarmed him in Diagon alley demanding everything from autographs to his intercession with the Light aspect of Death - to the soles of his green dragonhide boots and sneered.

"We don't want any mudblood filth in here." the blond boy said once he'd finished his examination of the newcomer.

"Your loss." Harry said as he backed out and searched for a new compartment.

After finding that everywhere else was either full or contained more of those "Anti-Mudblood snobs, he eventually found a compartment at the end of the train that had a sole redheaded occupant who didn't mind his sitting down. He had attempted to strike up a conversation with the boy, but they didn't seem to share the same interests even in areas where their worlds seemed to overlap. Eventually, he pulled out the latest volume of Defenders of Midgar and started reading.

"You're reading that backwards." the boy said with a snort of laughter.

"No I'm not." he said as he flipped the Manga around.

"You read Japanese?" The boy said in surprise.

"Is that what it's called here?" he asked.

"Yeah. Bill sent us some stuff from Japan a while back, before he settled into his job in Egypt." the boy said. "I liked the Dragon Ball Comic, even though I couldn't read it. Mom threw a fit and confiscated it because the kid with the tail wandered around naked though."

"I'm Ron Weasley." The boy said.

"Harry Potter." he replied.

"No Way!" Ron exclaimed.

"Way." he said. "I don't understand why I'm so famous though."

"You got hit by the Killing Curse and survived!" Ron said, as if the reason were obvious.

"Yes, and my mother had done something to stop it from killing me. Why should I be more famous than she was? I read the books I'm in, and my mother's barely even mentioned. God, I even read those crappy fiction novels that were supposedly based on my life, and she isn't even mentioned in those." he replied.

"Did you get all your books at Flourish and Blotts?" Ron asked.

"Yeah." he replied.

"They may as well be called Pureblood Press. You won't find too many books by or about muggleborn wizards and witches there." Ron replied. "My family has only been going there for school books since Charlie found a rather neat "Alternative" bookstore in Hogsmeade that's run by a muggleborn. Their comics section is awesome, It's got everything from the Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle to Spiderman. Your mother is all over the religion section. I think there's even a movement to have her canonized as a saint. I heard that a few of the priests in the Wizarding Church have already sent their requests to the Pope."

"Wizarding Church?" he asked.

"The Magical world's branch of the Roman Catholic Church. We've got a bunch of Protestant denominations, and several ancient Pagan religions as well. My family's mostly non-religious, but we call in a vicar from the WC of E for weddings and funerals." Ron replied.

It was at that point that the door to the compartment slid open, and a certain blond and his two mini bodyguards poked their noses inside. The boy peered around the compartment, and his eyes rested on Harry.

"Aw crap." the boy muttered.

"Was there something you wanted, because we don't allow stuck up snobs in here. State your business and get gone." Harry said.

The blond boy puffed up like one of the exotic fish in the aquarium in the Headquarters' Lobby, and turned "Sephiroth found Angeal's underwear on the living-room floor again" red (apparently being one of the few people pale enough to be able to do so). That particular shade hadn't exactly existed until after some deranged fangirl had torched Uncle Sephiroth's apartment, and Sephiroth had moved in with Angeal for the whole safety in numbers thing. Sephiroth has been occupying Angeal's guest bedroom for the last five years except for when Angeal kicks him to the couch so his mother could take the room during her infrequent visits. The only reason Angeal hasn't kicked him out entirely, is that Sephiroth doesn't make messes, and he pays half the rent and utilities.

"You'd better learn some manners Half-blood, or you'll end up going the same way as your parents!" the blond snarled.

"Dying to protect someone I love? That doesn't sound like a half bad way to go actually." he replied.

It was at that point that the blond tried to pick a fight. Key word there being tried. He and his bodyguards promptly got their asses handed to them before they were unceremoniously thrown from the compartment. Just because Harry was more of a bookworm didn't mean that he didn't know how to defend himself. With most of the people he considered family either being Turks or in SOLDIER, it would be kinda hard not to.

A long while later, while he was absorbed in correcting the spelling and grammar in one of his textbooks and Ron was busy playing chess against himself, a bushy haired girl and a small pudgy boy walked into their compartment.

"Have you seen a toad?" The bushy haired Girl asked, "Neville's lost one."

Harry dropped his book in surprise. Who would actually be stupid enough to keep a Toad? Oh, wait, the toads in this universe were harmless animals that hopped around and didn't do much else. Uncle Genesis had once told him a hilarious story about a prank Uncle Angeal pulled on Uncle Zack after he got back from that hospital in America, back when he was a toddler. Apparently Uncle Zack was deathly afraid of Toads because of something that had happened to him when he was a little kid. Zack apparently used to get picked on for that as a kid, because Toads were so common around Gongaga that Maiden's Kiss was a standard item in a First-Aid kit.

"No, but I'll be glad to help you look for it." he replied before turning towards his companion. "You coming Ron?"

"In a minute." Ron said vaguely, apparently absorbed in his chess game.

"Are you playing Wizards Chess?" the bushy haired girl asked Ron excitedly, having apparently only just noticed him. "How does it compare to regular chess? Are there different rules? Does the fact that the pieces talk back affect game-play? If so, how?"

Ron looked up from his game and stared for a moment before he sighed and reset the board.

"How about I show you?" Ron said as he made room for the girl.

"Come on, Neville was it?" Harry said. "Those two look like they'll be busy for a while. Let's go find your toad."

As Harry and Neville poked around the train searching for Trevor - who had apparently been a gift from one of Neville's relatives - they discussed their hopes for the next seven years of schooling. Neville seemed convinced that he'd be sorted into Hufflepuff, and seemed to believe that it would be a bad thing.

"What about what you want?" Harry asked curiously.

"Gryffindor." Neville said, just a bit too quickly.

"Why?" Harry asked.

"Because my father was a Gryffindor?" Neville said shyly.

"What are your hobbies?" Harry asked, wondering if that would get him closer to an honest answer about what Neville would want in a house, since from what he'd learned so far Gryffindor was for people like Uncle Zack who ran into danger without really thinking first, Slytherin was for people more like President Lazard, Hufflepuff would be more Uncle Angeal's cup of tea, and Ravenclaw would be more Uncle Sephiroth or Uncle Genesis' area.

Neville launched into a discussion on Botany that would have left even some of the guys in the Science Department reeling from information overload. The boy was apparently a whiz at both the practical and theoretical elements of the science. Several of his home grown experiments had even panned out, sometimes in completely unexpected ways. Had he been back home, the Science Department would have been practically drooling over the little prodigy. They tended to avoid him like the plague after he'd accidentally blown up one too many experiments. That was fine by him, since he planned on going into SOLDIER anyways.

"Are you sure you're not a Ravenclaw?" He ended up asking the boy, cutting across a dissertation on the crossbreeding of magical and non-magical plants.

Neville blinked and stared at him for a moment, as if he had never even considered the possibility. Apparently he hadn't.

"But I'm not...I'm not...I'm not smart enough." Neville mumbled.

"Not smart enough? Hell, you just gave a lecture that would have left several of the guys in Shinra's Science Department scratching their heads, and you're not smart enough?" He replied.

Neville gaped at him.

"Let's just find your toad." He said.


	8. Chapter 8

After finding Neville's toad, Harry and his companion resettled themselves in the compartment where the Weasley boy was teaching the bushy haired girl whose name turned out to be Hermione how to play chess. Soon afterward, they arrived at their destination. While the Hogwarts castle was impressive, Harry didn't think that it was half as impressive as the ancient fortress Angeal had brought him on a tour of when he was eight. After a short boat ride, the newly minted first years reached the castle where they were led to a room and told to smarten themselves up before they were ordered to line up and make their way to the Great Hall for the Sorting. All too soon, the Deputy Headmistress had made her way half-way down the list.

&!&!&

Neville Longbottom was shaking so hard he was practically vibrating by the time he'd reached the stool and the Sorting Hat was placed upon his head. It was much too large for him and nearly slid down to his chin.

_What have we here?_ A voice suddenly said in the darkness.

_Not Hufflepuff?_ The voice asked before he could say anything. _Then where?_

Neville started to think Gryffindor, but suddenly paused remembering the two potential friends he had made, one of which was already a Ravenclaw and the other who was sure to become one.

_Ravenclaw? Your pursuit of knowledge seems to be limited to one particular area of interest. _The voice said.

After a pause the voice said _Eh, it could work. _And suddenly, there was a loud shout of _**RAVENCLAW!**_ right next to his ear.

&!&!&

After the Sorting Feast, Harry Potter had barely had time to register the fact that his bed was between that of Neville Longbottom and Anthony Goldstein before a Prefect came to bring him to the Headmaster's office.

"Harry, sit." the Headmaster said as he gestured to one of the chairs in front of his desk as soon as the boy entered the office. Harry's new head of house Filius Flitwick had occupied the other.

"When we went to check up on you at your aunt's house upon noticing that the first few letters we sent had gone unanswered, we discovered that you weren't there and hadn't been there since about a month after you were left in your aunt's care." Dumbledore said "We are understandably concerned since you haven't been living with your legal guardian and don't know anything about the people who took care of you or where you were raised."

Harry was glad that his uncles had given him a cover story, or he wouldn't have known how to answer that question.

"It's a long story sir, but to make it short I've been living with my uncle Genesis in an isolated town about a hundred miles north of Denver." Harry said. He'd given Dumbledore the approximate location of a certain enclave of genetically altered wizards and witches, killing two birds with one stone since it would answer just about any question over certain physiological oddities such as the fact that his eyes glowed in the dark on occasion. Genesis had visited the place often enough after his annual checkups that he would be recognized if someone came asking about a man matching his description, making the story more airtight. He'd been told not to inform anyone that he was living in an entirely different universe as that could possibly cause trouble.

"Uncle?" Dumbledore asked. "I was unaware of the fact that your mother had any male siblings."

"It's a long story sir, but the gist of it was that my mother's family had come to England for a visit during which they went on a camping trip. Mother vanished during the trip around the same time that someone's pet panther got loose. When the panther was caught a couple hours later, there was blood on it. Both her family and the authorities had assumed that she had gotten eaten by the panther when in actuality she had wandered into a tent in another campsite and was found by its owner. When he didn't hear about anyone searching for her over the next couple days and failed to put two and two together about the tourists' daughter that had gotten eaten by a wild animal, he sent her to a local orphanage. About a month later, the Evans family came to the orphanage to look for a son to adopt since Mrs. Evans wasn't able to have any more children due to a mistake a doctor made while delivering her daughter Petunia, and left with my mother instead." Harry said.

"How did your uncle find you if he believed your mother to be dead?" Dumbledore asked.

"He never accepted my mother's death since one or two parts of the story didn't add up, and when he grew up he went to find answers. When he had found and interviewed the man who had found my mother while he was tracking down everyone who had been camping in the woods that day, he learned that the man had kept track of her because he had grown fond of her during the few days he knew her, but hadn't been in a position where he would be able to adopt her himself. From there, he found my Aunt Petunia's address. Petunia had been happy to find that there was another relative that would be willing to care for me because her husband Vernon was an abusive drunk like his sister, and she didn't know what he would do to me if I stayed considering the fact that he hadn't wanted me there in the first place." Harry said.

The Headmaster looked saddened at this.

"Do you like living with your uncle?" Dumbledore asked.

"Yeah. He's busy most of the time, but there's always someone to watch me. Usually Uncle Zack and Aunt Aerith, or Uncle Tseng, or Reno and Cessnei, or Uncle Cloud and Aunt Tifa, sometimes Uncle Angeal and Uncle Sephiroth as well. Now that Uncle Genesis has started training recruits full time, I see alot more of him." Harry replied.

"Uncle Angeal and Uncle Sephiroth?" Flitwick asked noticing that Harry had used "and" when referring to couples.

"Uncle Sephiroth moved into Uncle Angeal's apartment after a crazy fan girl set his on fire. Something about refusing her love and eternal devotion or something. It was supposed to be temporary, but since Uncle Sephiroth didn't make any messes, didn't throw any wild parties when they weren't wanted and paid half the rent and utilities on time, Uncle Angeal never bothered to ask him to move out." Harry replied.

"What is a Fangirl?" Dumbledore asked, honestly curious as he had not encountered the term before.

"It's a girl or woman who has a crush on you and takes it way too far. Some of them are certifiably insane. Sometimes, when there is more than one woman with a crush on the same guy, they'll form something called a fan club. A bunch of women who had a crush Uncle Genesis banded together and started calling themselves Red Leather after the coat my uncle likes to wear. A bunch of the Red Leather crowd broke off before I was born and formed something called the Study Group which ostensibly studied LOVELESS, but really they just gossiped about my Uncle. When I was little, one of the Red Leather crowd got themselves hired as my babysitter and kidnapped me, hoping to force my uncle to marry her. After that, he never left me with anyone he didn't personally know and made sure my caretakers carried at least one weapon on them at all times. Reno started carrying a rocket propelled grenade launcher every time he watched me as something of a joke. I never did get Turk humor." Harry replied.

"Thank you Harry, you were most informative. You may return to your dorm now since you are undoubtedly exhausted. I would suggest that you meet with Madam Hooch later. I'm sure you'll find that you both have a great deal in common." Dumbledore said.

"Do you think that story about his mother was true?" Flitwick asked as soon as Harry left, clearly concerned that someone had taken Harry for their own ends and fed him lies to convince him that they were family.

"Yes. It is an unfortunate fact that during the early sixties an extremely dangerous creature that a rather foolish wizard had bred in his back yard had gotten loose. What is not as well known due to the fact that the Minister at the time suppressed the information hoping to prevent a scandal since the wizard was a relative is that while the creature was loose, it had eaten several small children including those that had belonged to the wizard himself before it was captured in a wilderness area. If Lily's family had been out having what the Americans call a "Muggle Experience" where they stick to completely muggle areas and don't bring anything magical, they could have been accidentally obliviated especially if a mass obliviation was being done in the area. Children under the age of six generally aren't obliviated due to the possibility of brain damage and the fact that children that young generally aren't believed when they start talking about things that are "out of the ordinary" so obliviation usually isn't necessary. It is a clear possiblility that her brother had a vague memory of her going in an entirely different direction than the one in which the creature had been." Dumbledore replied.

"There is further proof in the fact that the post owls hadn't been able to find Harry until he indicated that he wanted to be found by visiting Alastor, indicating that he was behind an extremely powerful set of wards such as the blood wards whose anchors I had set on the letter I left with him when I gave him to the Dursley family. Blood wards require one of two things to be effective, either a tie of love or a tie of blood. While Lily may have been adopted, Petunia's was the only living family I knew existed as Lily's origins had been a complete mystery, and her love for her sister would have activated the wards to a degree. As long as someone in that house cared for Harry, the wards would protect him. As like calls to like, I had expected Petunia's son to further strengthen the wards through brotherly affection. Ties of blood would have been a more powerful and effective option however, and in this case Harry had the good fortune to have had a surviving male blood relative on his mother's side of the family to whom the wards could be transferred. There is also an indication that this relative truly cared for him, providing both elements and making the wards far stronger than they would have been had he remained with his mother's adoptive sister. While the news that Harry wasn't where I had expected him to be was unpleasantly surprising, being taken was probably the best thing to have happened to him. The few moments I spoke with Vernon Dursley during the Potters' wedding did indicate that he had an extremely abusive nature, and I believed that Harry would have had something of a hard time of it growing up in his household even with his aunt and cousin alleviating some of the worst of his treatment of the boy." Dumbledore continued.

"Why didn't you check up on Harry before?" Flitwick asked. It had stunned him and the few other people that knew about the visit to the Dursleys after the letters had not been responded to that Harry had been gone for ten years without anyone realizing it.

"I knew I could not be seen in the area due to the possibility that I would be tracked there, so instead I set someone to look in on the boy every once in a while. Originally I had planned on a squib named Arabella Figg, but Alastor Moody outbidded me on the only available house in the neighborhood at the time, apparently deciding that a house that was identical to just about every other house around it would be harder to find especially if a Confundus ward was placed around the edges of the property. Since Moody had been a member of the order and I had trusted him, I requested that he look in on Harry every once in a while. I assumed that nothing was amiss when he never called in to report any problems, and had actually sent me a muggle photo of Harry celebrating his fifth birthday in which the Dursley boy was spinning Harry around in preparation to hit something called a Pinata. When I confronted him after my brief visit to the Dursleys, Moody had explained that he knew who the boy's guardian was and found him to be a far safer choice than the Dursleys who would be the first target of a sufficiently intelligent Dark Wizard or at least one that was well acquainted with the muggle world - or at the very least, marginally acquainted with the Muggle world and knew how to use a phone book - and that he had told the truth about Harry being fine. Now that I have seen Harry for myself, I know his report to be accurate." Dumbledore replied.

With that, Flitwick and Dumbledore changed the subject of their conversation to class schedules. Once again Potions was getting the Gryffindor/Slytherin and Ravenclaw/Hufflepuff pairings that had oddly enough been determined over several decades of trial and error to be the least explosive despite Gryffindor and Slytherin's intense rivalry. Nobody wanted a repeat of the Gryffindor/Ravenclaw class that had resulted in Potions being moved to a heavily warded section of the dungeons after an experiment gone awry blew out one of the castle walls. Brains and Bravery made for a very dangerous combination.


	9. Chapter 9

Albus Dumbledore's hands shook as he prepared to do something he knew was completely wrong before he headed down to breakfast. He looked down at the completed Elixir of Life once more, feeling slightly guilty for betraying his friend's trust. He wasn't guilty enough to stop himself from drinking it though, which paradoxically made him feel even guiltier. Ten seconds later, he was vomiting into a nearby wastepaper basket. Dear God in Heaven, that stuff was awful, and he'd drank any number of foul tasting potions over his long life. If drinking that every day was what was required for Eternal Life, he didn't want it. The arthritis was bad enough.

When the time came, he would happily embrace death.

With that thought in mind, he gargled with his favorite orange flavored mouthwash and popped a lemon drop into his mouth, hoping to rid himself of the incredibly horrible aftertaste. No such luck. It was as if the foul substance had coated his tongue.

That god awful aftertaste remained with him throughout breakfast, completely ruining what would otherwise have been an excellent meal.

Yes, when the time came, he would very gladly embrace death, and go to the Next Great Adventure with a joyful heart. His friend Nicholas had to be completely insane if he was willing to endure what he'd experienced this morning for centuries on end in order to cling to this portion of his existence.

&!&!&!&

"Mr. Flamel, Mrs. Flamel," the healer said as soon as his examinations had been concluded. "You both are exceedingly healthy. The only problem that I noticed was that your sense of taste is far less acute than normal, but that seems to be correcting itself on its own. I can give you both potions to hasten the process if you would like."

Nicholas paled at this and almost flat out refused until he remembered that he could have sworn that he'd tasted something sweet that morning for the first time in centuries while he'd been eating his usual bowl of Raisin Bran. He had another several months before Dumbledore would be returning his stone, and he could deaden his sense of taste again when the time came. Until then, until then...

"Yes, I'd like that very much." Nicholas Flamel said with an almost wistful smile as he remembered the flavor of fresh baked bread so strongly that he could almost taste it.

Pernelle looked at him as if he were insane.

"We have several months dear." he said to his wife of more than six centuries.

"I'd like that too." Pernelle said after a moment's thought.

&!&!&!&

Harry stared at the breakfast table on the morning of his first day of classes. More specifically, he stared at the fruit bowl. Moody didn't keep a fruit bowl out in his house as there was too much of a chance of someone poisoning him, so he wasn't all that familiar with the local fruit in this universe. One of the varieties of fruit in the bowl looked both familiar and alien at the same time.

"What's wrong?" one of his fellow Ravenclaws who looked to be a year or two above him asked.

"Aren't dumbapples supposed to be purple?" he asked as he pointed to the red fruit that looked like a dumbapple.

"Apples usually come in red, green or yellow or a combination of all three colors." the Ravenclaw said. "I've never come across a purple variety."

"Weird." he said before grabbing one of the apples off the top, wondering if they tasted half as good as the ones on the tree back home.

As he was biting into the fruit that had a flavor that was both foreign and familiar at the same time, his new friends, or at least the two people he hoped were his friends, joined him at the table. As they were sitting down, the red haired boy named Ron who turned out to be one of four siblings currently attending waved either to him or to them on his way to the Gryffindor table.

"So, which class do you think will be the most interesting?" Hermione asked as she reached for a slice of toast.

"Potions. I was rather fond of Chemistry back home, and I want to see how this class compares." he replied, starting off a discussion on chemistry and several related fields that Neville began to get involved in when Hermione had made a comment about various substances that were extracted from plants. It was nice to have people his age he could talk to without either being forced to dumb himself down, or getting a glazed expression from in return.

Yes, he most definitely had found his kind in Ravenclaw as the Sorting Hat had said he would when it sang that ridiculous song at the beginning of the Sorting Ceremony last night...

_He felt nervous as he waited for his name to be called. He'd watched as two of the friendly people he'd met on the train had been sorted into Ravenclaw, and the blond and his wannabe bodyguards were sorted into Slytherin which seemed to be a dumping ground for the "Anti-mudblood" crowd as well as a haven for the the truly ambitious. Eventually, his name had been called, and it was his turn to sit on the rickety stool and have the patched, frayed, and rather filthy looking hat which he prayed had some sort of spell that repelled lice on it placed on his head._

_Due to the fact that the head size of the original owner who was undoubtedly an adult was quite a bit larger than his own, the hat had slipped past his ears and nearly down to his chin as it had on several of the other smaller children in his year. While he was exceedingly fit and in perfect health despite a correctable eye problem that appeared to be hereditary, he was still a bit small for his age. His uncle Genesis had informed him that he'd been that way at his age as well._

_"Hmm. A little bit tricky. You've got loads of courage, a good deal of ambition, a strong sense of loyalty as well as a strong work ethic, but I do believe that your thirst for knowledge does seem to outweigh them all, if only very slightly in some areas." the voice that belonged to the hat whispered in his ear so closely that he could almost hear it in his head. "Yes, RAVENCLAW would be a good fit for you."_

_An instant later, the hat was being pulled off his head, and he was walking to his new house table amidst a round of tumultuous applause._ _He smiled as he sat down next to Neville and Hermione after he'd been sorted. He had met the two on the train when they had come into his compartment looking for Neville's toad. Hermione's half formed theories on magic had been enlightening to say the least. He could see the two of them becoming the sort of friends that wouldn't betray him because he was the "Unpopular Bookworm Freak that had to be a science experiment or something". The thought of that happening warmed his heart somewhat._

_"I'm glad you're here with me. I wasn't certain I would be here either, I thought I was Hufflepuff material for sure." Neville said as soon as he was settled._

_"Don't sell yourself short, I noticed that you were able to keep up with my and Hermione's conversation. Considering the fact that Hermione's here for the same reason I am which is because we both finished high school several years early and our families wanted to wait a while and have us interact with children our own age before they sent us off to college, that's a pretty impressive feat for someone your, our age." Harry said. _

_Neville visibly perked up at this, and they both watched as near the tail end of the sorting, the red haired boy whose name was Ronald Weasley was sorted into Gryffindor. He almost pitied the boy, as going by either Alphabetical order or Kana order, Weasley would almost always be one of the last ones called._

_The feast that followed the sorting had been rather nice, even though the food had been somewhat unusual. Fortunately he recognized some of the dishes as there were some commonalities between foods from his world and here, and he had sampled some of the local cuisine during his infrequent visits to this universe._

All too soon breakfast was over and it was time to attend classes. He had Potions a couple of days from now, and was looking forward to seeing if it lived up to his expectations. He waved to the Weasley boy in passing on his way out of the Great Hall. The boy smiled happily and eagerly waved back.


	10. Chapter 10

Classes proved to be both simultaneously interesting and boring at the same time. Interesting, because he'd always loved schoolwork, and he was in a new environment. Boring, because many of the new things he was seeing in this new environment weren't as interesting as some of the things he'd seen back home. Sure, the fact that Professor McGonagall was able to turn into a cat was interesting, but he'd seen people turn into much stranger, and he'd seen far weirder in the Shinra science labs.

He'd managed to get his matchstick to turn into a needle after several tries in transfiguration, and had listened with rapt interest as the intuitive Charms professor had spoken of the many uses of his field. History of magic was just plain boring, and the ghost that taught it should have been fired ages ago. He and Neville had barely managed to stay awake, and Hermione took copious notes, but that was more out of fear of falling behind and facing ridicule than out of any actual interest in the class. The time in primary school when she'd raised her hand and given a wrong answer had left a deep mark that had yet to fade, and the girl feared to show anything less than perfection in academic areas since she feared that people would doubt her intelligence if she did.

Wednesday finally came, and with it the Potions class that he was so curious about since it sounded so different from anything else he'd seen so far. The things that might be potion equivalents in his world were all carefully cooked up in Shinra's labs, and he'd never been allowed to participate in the process. About the only thing that was potionlike that he'd been allowed to handle were Potions, and that was because they pretty much came standard in just about every First-Aid kit.

The class started off with a rather sallow skinned, hook-nosed, greasy haired individual banging open the door that led from the teacher's office to the classroom and making a speech that was apparently meant to be intimidating to the young Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff students who were gathered in the room. Based on the squeaking noise that the Abbot girl had made, the man's objective had partially been met.

After the speech was given, the professor whose name was apparently Snape had started calling roll, pausing at his name and giving him an indecipherable look as he did so. It wasn't as if the man wasn't feeling anything, or holding back his emotions, it was as if the man was feeling so many things that he didn't know what to hold onto or how. Why he would cause that reaction, he didn't know.

Following roll, the class was set to creating a simple Boil Curing potion. He'd ended up being paired up with Boot, and Neville with Goldstein. In the middle of the lesson throughout which the professor had stalked through the classroom like a large predator wandering from desk to desk peering into each cauldron and offering either praise or a rebuke depending on what he saw, there was a loud hiss as Neville and Anthony's cauldron had started to melt. As the two jumped up on their stools to escape the hissing potion that was eating its way into the floor, Professor Snape swooped down on them like a hawk upon its prey.

"I honestly don't know how an idiot like you ended up in Ravenclaw." Snape snarled at the whimpering Neville whose potion had just failed spectacularly.

"I've only worked with the plant based theoretical tables, Gran's never let me near potions ingredients that weren't growing in the ground before much less within fifteen feet of a fire that wasn't for flooing purposes." Neville got out through the pain of the boils that were growing on his skin.

Snape just blinked before sending Neville and his partner to the hospital wing. Snape then rounded on him the instant his fellow Ravenclaws were gone.

"And you, why didn't you tell him to put the porcupine quills in after he'd removed the cauldron from the fire? Were you just trying to make yourself look good?" Snape asked.

"Sorry, I wasn't trying to make myself look good. Potions are different where I come from." he said in as non-confrontational tone as he could manage, knowing that anything else would just set the man off because he'd dealt with teachers like Snape before.

Snape was actually pretty mild compared to that Wutian language teacher he'd had who'd constantly gotten on his case because he was being raised by Shinra SOLDIERs. That man who'd constantly hurled abuse at him in three languages had knocked points off his grade for everything from making a single imperfect stroke in a character to blinking one too many times during an oral presentation.

* * *

When he had turned on the Potter child who'd sat there and let the Longbottom boy make the only mistake that could possibly turn the Boil Curing potion into a cauldron melting toxic mess, he had expected the boy to respond defiantly, as arrogant as his father would have been. The boy had been rather subdued in his reply as he'd explained that potion making was different where he lived.

"Really? How so?" Snape asked the Potter boy, mildly curious about how brewing processes differed in America where they were constantly innovating, often experimenting with bringing muggle scientific techniques into the mix. Asking was also part of his job, since the Headmaster had told him and the other professors to gather any information they could about Potter and his home life. According to what the Headmaster had gathered, Harry had been living in a fideliused town that was just beyond the outskirts of a town whose entire population were Augmented. There were some indications that Harry's mother had been of the Augmented as well.

"It's what we call the stuff that SOLDIER operatives are supposed to drink when they either get hurt or are running low on energy. They consist of about two drops of Elixer of Life mixed with about a tablespoon and a half of Snow Cherry flavored cough syrup and a liter of Crazy Chocobo Energy Soda." Potter replied almost meekly, though obviously holding something on the subject back, something that quite likely had to do with industrial secrets considering the fact that the portion of America the boy had been living in was known for innovations in all areas of the medical field.

"What's the cough syrup and the soda supposed to do?" he asked after a moment of careful thought, since Elixer of Life should be able to take care of the problem by itself if his studies on the subject had been correct. Apparently Flamel hadn't just been selling off the gold he created to Gringotts like he had claimed.

"Get rid of the flavor of the Elixer of Life. It's apparently the only combo that can do so." Potter replied.

"Why would someone want to mask the flavor of the Elixer of Life?" he asked. His professional curiosity had been piqued, as he'd never been given the opportunity to work with the Elixer of Life in any capacity since Flamel had reputedly jealously guarded it and the process of manufacturing it, making it the most expensive substance that a Potions Master could ever get their hands on. Most Potions Masters had never seen so much as a drop of the substance in their entire life. He'd read that the flavor of undiluted Elixer of Life was highly unpleasant, but then again so were the flavors of a wide variety of other potions and nobody bothered to mask them.

"Uncle Angeal told me that undiluted Elixer of Life tastes like liquefied human excrement with a side of going down on a whore with a bad infection that you really don't want to know the name of. When I asked him how he knew, he told me that there are some dares you should never take no matter how many times your best friend calls you a coward." Potter replied with a slightly amused smirk that was so reminiscent of his father that he'd felt his fingers twitching, itching to have his wand in his hand in order to counter what would be coming next as old instincts rose to the fore.

Realizing that the students in the class appeared to be distracted, focusing on him and his conversation with Potter who looked like his father except for the hauntingly familiar cheekbones and those eyes rather than their potions like they should have, he turned to face the room.

"Get back to work!" he snarled, causing one of the more excitable Hufflepuffs to make a squeaking noise as everyone hastily turned back to their cauldrons.

Resolving to talk to Potter further at a later date, he turned and stalked around the room making sure that the brats weren't messing up such a simple potion too badly. Teaching was an exceedingly nervewracking experience which constantly grated on his sensibilities and was pretty close to his idea of what Hell would be were he there. It was however his punishment for the road he had taken in life, and he had no other choice than to do so since Dumbledore had him by the short and curlies, and nobody outside of Hogwarts would be willing to hire him because of his past.


	11. Chapter 11

As the scent of baking pumpkin wafted through the halls on Halloween, Harry wondered if it would taste good prepared the way the kitchen staff were making it for the feast in honor of Samhain. Well, technically, it was in honor of both Samhain and All Hallow's Eve. That had been another of those things that the Founders had argued on, as two of them had been Christian and two pagan, Salazar and Godric arguing on this issue most fiercely. In the end, since both celebrations took place on the same day, there had been a sort of general feast before the Christian and the Pagan students split up and followed the traditions custom and religion dictated, some of which coincided. Today however, the feast was the only remnant of the traditional Halloween activities that had taken place at Hogwarts in centuries past.

The nearly two months leading up to this day had been somewhat mundane compared to life in Midgar. Fortunately, there had been the task of assimilating himself into an alien culture to keep him occupied. Some of the things the wizards did in the normal course of their days and lives were frankly incomprehensible. Of course, they came from a different world where the environment was different as well as the wildlife, so it was only logical that their society would evolve along different lines.

His friends had helped him to adapt to life in this world. Neville and Hermione who were his two best friends in Ravenclaw were fonts of information when it came to British wizarding and British Muggle society, which was useful, since he knew little about British Wizarding society, and just a little more about the Muggle side of things. Ronald Weasley and his brothers were good for when he was in the mood for some more physical pursuits as neither Neville nor Hermione were fond of running around or rolling in the dirt. The boys aside from Percy who was trying to maintain a certain reputation in order to further his chances at a Ministry career had taught him a number of games they'd learned over the years including Gnome Pitching. Draco, while not being his friend, was around him often enough, providing him insight into the views of British Wizarding aristocracy, or the closest thing to it there was through his constant snide remarks and insults which failed to get the rise out of him that the other boy wanted.

Flying was fun, and as soon as he was allowed to, he would be getting his own broom. He'd probably even take it back to his world to see if it worked there, and if it did, buy the Shinra science department a spare one that could be studied and reverse-engineered. He knew that such things would be popular amongst daredevils like Uncle Zack. Something that flies, goes fast, and has little to no safety equipment would be close to the ultimate thrill ride. Having been introduced to Quiddich by Ron and his brothers, he could say that he liked it and that he would be trying out for Chaser next year since a slot should be open.

Classes had remained that steady combination between intriguing and boring. The teachers were a mixed bag, but none of them were as bad as his Wutian language teacher or even that sharp-eyed Math teacher he'd had for his last year of high school, and so far none of them were as eccentric as that one science tutor he'd had when he was six. Snape had a bit of a temper, but he'd had nothing on Rufus Shinra who'd been forced to step down from his position after footage of the man trying to strangle him when he was little had gotten out and caused a great deal of negative publicity for the company, ending a long string of such events that had gotten covered over with the victims either being payed off or threatened into silence. McGonagall was stern but fair in the classroom, and practically useless everywhere else, since she was stuck doing three jobs as well as half the Headmaster's job since the Headmaster had three jobs and a government leader demanding his attention as well. Flitwick was funny, nice, and had a bad habit of turning a blind eye to the bullying in his house since he thought it would prepare the kiddies for the real world where there may be worse lying in wait for them. Sprout was nice and had a great love of her plants, Sinistra had a sharp pinch which she used to keep sleepy students awake, Hooch was fun, and Binns was as boring as hell.

Aside from running into and defeating the three-headed dog that was this world's version of a Cerberus which had been guarding a trap door which had led to a half grown Devil's Snare which was easily defeated and finding a winged key to unlock a door and being stymied by a chess set and being caught and stuck in detention for two weeks, he hadn't really had any adventures. Nothing like the time Uncle Zack had took him to Gongaga and he'd been picked up and carried off by that Griffin. It was just as well, seeing as he was supposed to be in school studying.

When his friends had heard of his single adventure, they'd been torn between shocked and amused. The Weasley boys aside from Percy who'd given him a rather disdainful glare had patted him on the back and commiserated with him over the two weeks' detention. Neville had gone a bit pale, though his interest had perked up a bit at the mention of the Devil's Snare and he'd asked a couple of questions about that. Hermione had been stunned, horrified, and then absolutely livid, especially over the loss of points to Ravenclaw which had negated all of the points she'd managed to accrue over the month. She ended up completely refusing to speak with him until he'd ended up in the Hospital Wing after some jerk had pushed him down the stairs.

After his detentions had ended in the middle of the month, things had settled back into their usual routine, and Halloween, which was one of the few holidays the school celebrated had come around. Ron and Hermione ended up having one of their infamous spats at the end of Charms after Hermione had corrected the boy on his pronunciation, exacerbating his inferiority complex which was the result of being the youngest of six boys in a financially disadvantaged home and not having being the baby of the family to mitigate at least some of that because his sister had taken the title a year or so after he was born. Words were exchanged outside of the classroom, and after the Gryffindors and Ravenclaws had split up, he'd been stuck spending the rest of the day smoothing Hermione's ruffled feathers while Neville warily hung in the background.

The feast had turned out to be excellent, which had rather perked up both his and Hermione's moods. As they ate, Neville shared stories of Halloween celebrations he'd been to back home and how one of his cousins from Cornwall had kept bringing him apples every Halloween. When things were winding down however, Professor Quirrel came in yelling about a troll being in the Dungeons. There was a general panic in which there was a great deal of screaming, but unfortunately for his plans to have a decent adventure to share with Uncle Zack when he went home for the Winter Holidays, someone had heard his exclamation of "Alright! A troll!" over it.

A yell of "Sit down Mr. Potter! In fact, all of you, sit down!" immediately followed, silencing the students. Following the yell was a comment of "But, aren't the dormitories better warded?" and a hasty discussion amongst the professors.

And, that was the end of that. While the prefects supervised the students who'd been locked in the Great Hall, the professors went out in search of the troll which they found ten minutes later taking a dump in one of the toilets in a girl's restroom. According to popular rumor, Headmaster Dumbledore had conjured a newspaper, handed it to the troll, and let the creature finish its business before the professors had herded it out of the castle.

* * *

Many miles away from Hogwarts, as the staff were dealing with a troll, two people were having a Halloween feast of their own. The food wasn't so much food as dessert, and it wasn't being served at a table. Had anyone else aside from an elderly and half-blind House Elf been there to witness the scene, there would've been a scream of "MY EYES! MY EYES! OBLIVIATE! OBLIVIATE! OBLIVIATE!". But there wasn't, so the couple remained undisturbed.

"More chocolate dear?" Nicholas asked.

"Hmmm. I think I'll try the butterscotch this time." Pernelle replied.

With a smile, Nicholas transferred some butterscotch flavored syrup from a dish to somewhere that a person other than Pernelle probably wouldn't want to think of considering the age of the person involved, and the number of wrinkles it got caught in. People most likely wouldn't want to know what Pernelle did following that either.

* * *

In another world, three men were fighting. Technically it was a sparring session, but they were going at it hammer and tongs, so it may as well have been considered a fight. One man who was usually able to rather handily hold the other two off seemed to be struggling against them.

"What's wrong Sephiroth?" Angeal asked as a blow nearly took his opponent's head off.

"Not having the cheering section is distracting." Sephiroth replied.

"I miss him too." Angeal replied.

"We all miss him." Genesis said.

* * *

**Omake:**

Year Four:

Dumbledore pulled his wand and pointed it at the man who was posing as his longtime friend and Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, silently binding him as he tried to go out the door.

"What gave me away?" the man asked once he was settled in a chair and bound even more securely.

"The fact that you didn't try to steal half the contents of my office." he replied.


End file.
